!co
'CD
CANADIAN
t
THE TREASURE OF THE CHURCH
The
Treasure of the Church
Or
THE SACRAMENTS OF DAILY LIFE
I BX
BY THE
VERY REV J. B. BAGSHAWE, D.D.
Canon Penitentiary of Southwark
Author of "THE THRESHOLD OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH '
J«
JESUIT PROViNCiAL'S RESIDENCE
TORONTO
Zonaon :
BURNS & GATES, LIMITED
NEW YORK, CINCINNATI, CHICAGO : BENZIGER BROTHERS
I 902
63684
fUbtl obstat:
J. CANONICUS MOVES,
Censor deputatus.
Imprimatur :
HERBERTUS CARDINALIS VAUGHAN,
Archiep. Westmonast.
FEB. 25, 1902.
All the quotations from the Roman Breviary
are taken from the Marquis of Bute's translation.
The Publishers beg to express their indebtedness
to the Rev. EMILE DU PLERNY, to whom Canon
Bagshawe, on his death-bed, entrusted the passing
of the proofs of this volume for the press, and who
has laboured unremittingly to give effect to the last
wishes of his friend.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER. PAGE.
i. CHRIST'S REAL PRESENCE, THE TREASURE
OF THE CHURCH I
II. THE NATURE AND METHOD OF THIS
PRESENCE 25
III. THE GIFT CONVEYED TO MAN . . 47
IV. OUR GUBST . . 7°
V. THE GIFT AND HOLY SCRIPTURE . . 94
VI. CHRIST OUR SACRIFICE I THE HOLY MASS . 122
VII. DEVOTIONS TO THE BLESSED SACRAMENT . l6o
VIII. PENANCE, THE SACRAMENT OF PURIFI
CATION . .184
IX. PENANCE, THE SACRAMENT OF AMENDMENT
AND OF PERFECTION . . . .214
PREFACE.
THE late Canon Bagshawe was a Priest for over
fifty years, some forty of which were spent in the
pastoral care of the mission of St. Elizabeth, at
Richmond. Few men have attached greater
importance to the spoken Word of God, and it was
with reluctance that he ever allowed to pass unused
any opportunity that came to him of preaching and
explaining the doctrines of the Catholic Church.
Thus every Sunday during his long ministry it was
his habit to preach three, or even four times. His
words were well prepared, and their arrangement
carefully thought out, and he thus acquired a power
of clear explanation, which was to serve him well
when the moment came for him to address a wider
audience. He felt that he might be of service to
many souls by writing books explanatory of
Christian Doctrine, which would help those who
were still outside the unity of the Church, and give
a better understanding of their religion to those who
were already Catholics. His earlier works, " The
Catechism and Holy Scripture," "The Threshold of
the Catholic Church," "The Credentials of the
x Preface
Catholic Church," " Rosary Meditations," and "The
Church," as well as " Catholic Sermons," which
were edited and for the most part written by
himself, are well known and have been widely
appreciated. The last months of his life were
given to the preparation of the present work, and
he passed to his rest before he could actually give it
to the press. In " The Treasure of the Church," he
explains at length, but in a clear and simple manner,
the two Sacraments which are in constant use among
the faithful — the Sacrament of the most Holy
Eucharist and the Sacrament of Penance.
In this, the last effort of his zeal and experience,
Catholics will find a ready means of acquainting
themselves with the place and position which,
according to the teaching of the Church, these two
great Sacraments should hold in their lives. They
will learn to understand more of the Divine Liturgy
which surrounds the Presence of Jesus Christ in
the Blessed Sacrament, and how better to enter into
the spirit of that worship. They will see, too, how
to profit by the dwelling of our Lord within them
in Holy Communion, and how to avail themselves
to the full of the cleansing power and the
strengthening grace of the Sacrament of Penance.
No one can read this book without finding in it a
fresher knowledge of his Faith, and a consequent
stimulus to live more entirely according to its
teaching.
Preface. xi
Those who are not Catholics may use this work
very profitably if they wish to know something of
the order, and method, and reasonableness of the
doctrines of the Catholic Church. Want of such
knowledge is one of the great hindrances to their
acceptance of Her claims, and we may be sure that
the enlightenment which a treatise of this nature
conveys, will remove many an obstacle from the
path of those who are hesitating in their course.
We trust, and have great confidence, that this
book, like all the others which came from the pen of
its lamented author, will in the fullest measure
realise the only object which he had in view, the
widespread knowledge of the teaching of the
Catholic Church to the salvation of many souls.
© FRANCIS,
Bishop of Sonthivark.
February 2%th, 1902.
ERRATUM.
Omit "of the Sacred Species" lines ij and
34-
THE TREASURE OF THE CHURCH.
CHAPTER I.
CHRIST'S REAL PRESENCE THE TREASURE OF
THE CHURCH.
Gives meaning- and vitality to her worship. — Her one great
Devotion. — This recognised from the beginning. — Her
one great Gift to man. — The " Mystery of Faith." — Test 01
our faith in the Incarnation. — God's universal Presence. —
His occasional manifestation of a special Presence. — His
abiding Presence in the Incarnation. — "All days." — The
Blessed Sacrament the continuation and completement of
the Incarnation.
" I am with you all days, to the consummation of the world."
— ST. MATT, xxviii. 20.
OUR Lord Jesus Christ sent His apostles to
perform the most difficult work ever intrusted to
human beings. They were to conquer the
world : they were to overcome the deepest 01
human prejudices, and to contend against all the
fiery passions of human nature. According to
human ideas, they were most imperfectly pro
vided for this great work. They had no
learning, and knew very little of the ways of
men ; they had no human power or influence to
back them, and they had no money. Not only
had they no money to entice men, but, from the
2
The Treasure of the Church.
beginning, they had to throw themselves on the
charity of their converts for their daily food :
" Eat and drink such things as are set before
you " (St. Luke x. 8). What could appear a
more hopeless task than such an undertaking !
So it was in the eyes of men ; but, in reality,
they were " needy, yet enriching many ; having
nothing, and possessing all things " (2 Cor. vi.
10). Our Lord had given them a treasure in
which was comprised all riches, and which at
once separated them by an immense interval
from all other men. That treasure was His own
perpetual presence: " All days to the consum
mation of the world."
The Church which our Lord was to establish
was to be something new : something which the
world had never before seen.
In establishing it, our Lord was carrying out
the prophecy of Daniel : " In the days of those
kingdoms the God of heaven will set up a
kingdom that shall never be destroyed" (Dan. ii.
44). The power and graces which He bestowed
on this new kingdom naturally were also new —
things which the world had never before
possessed. He left His own Presence to his
Church as its especial endowment, but it was a
new kind of Presence — such as had never before
been granted to men.
The object of this treatise is to explain the
nature of this wonderful Presence, and to dwell
on the duties which the Presence involves. In
the first place, it is this Presence which gives to
The Treasure of the Church.
the Catholic Church a power which in the long
run always brings victory. It gives a deep
meaning to almost everything we see in the
Catholic worship. You enter a Catholic church,
and this is the one thing specially presented to
your mind. A grand High Mass is going on.
the altar is lighted up, the priests stand around
in their vestments, the people bow down and
adore. What is the centre of all, and the expla
nation of all? It is the presence of the true
Body and Blood, the Soul and the Divinity of
our Lord and God ; it is Jesus Christ Himself
actually present, though concealed from our
senses, which gives a meaning to all this.
Without this belief all the forms and ceremonies
which we see, are but idle and useless waste of
time — but, with this great doctrine, all this
ceremonial is simple and intelligible.
Again, take some occasion of rejoicing, or of
lamentation, and you find the Blessed Sacrament
placed on Its throne, and the people around are
pouring out thanks, or lamentations or suppli
cations ; — here again this great Presence is the
simple explanation of all you see. What more
natural than that men should crowd round their
Lord on such occasions. Go into the church
when nothing particular is going on, — still you
will find worshippers pouring out their souls in
prayer. Why should they go to the church?
Simply because it is the house of God, and He
is present there, in a way in which He is not
present anywhere else. The people do not go
The Treasure of the Church.
to the church to hear men reading or talking ;
they go to put themselves in immediate commu
nication with their Saviour, to speak to Him
and to listen to His voice speaking in their
hearts.
" He hath made a remembrance of His
wonderful works, being a merciful and gracious
Lord. He hath given food to them that fear
Him "(Ps. ex. 4).
Yes, the Blessed Sacrament is the compendium
of all His wonderful works, and it is impossible
to be devoutly in the Presence of our Lord in
the Blessed Eucharist, without entering at least
implicitly into all the other mysteries of faith.
The Blessed Sacrament is the explanation of
nearly all we see in the Catholic Church, and,
still more, it accounts for the wondrous vitality
and constant victories of the Church.
Again and again she has seemed to be crushed
by the power of the world. At the Reformation,
the French Revolution, and many such trying
times, the Church appeared to men to be tottering
to her fall ; but the Lord was with her, and in
due time made His power felt. The Church
which had appeared so forlorn arose again
triumphant, unchanged in doctrine and dis
cipline. Could she have done this had she not
possessed the one central, all-embracing gift of
the perpetual Presence of our Lord Jesus
Christ?
The worship of our Lord in the Blessed
Sacrament is the one great devotion of the
The Treasure of the Church.
Church. Day after day, from year's end to year's
end, the Church is taken up with nothing else
than the worship of God Incarnate — especially
in the great Sacrament in which He is per
petually present.
It may be said that there are a vast number of
other devotions which, to strangers, would
seem to take the mind away from this central
mystery. All these things, however, are but a
fringe which surrounds and does honour to the
worship of Jesus, God and Man.
His Blessed Mother, the vast crowd of saints
commemorated, are His Court, deriving all their
importance and beauty from Him, reflecting His
glory, and at the same time bringing home to
us His greatness and magnificence.
I desire in these pages to dwell on the attri
butes and qualities of this great Sacrament at
rather greater length than can generally be
given to the subject in books of instruction, and
to dwell on some points connected with it which
I think are not always sufficiently put before the
faithful. I have spoken of the Blessed Sacra
ment as the treasure of the Catholic Church.
Without such a treasure, without a great gift,
which the world does not possess, how could the
Apostles hope to make any impression on the
heathen world? This great gift in which their
riches were to consist was Christ's own personal
presence. But this presence, to produce any
great impression on the world, must be some
thing widely different from His Presence else-
6 The Treasure of the Church.
where. God is everywhere. "In Him we live and
move and have our being" (Acts xvii. 28). " If
I ascend into heaven thou art there, if I descend
into hell thou art present " (Ps. cxxxviii. 8). This
Presence fills all things, and is necessary even for
the meanest creature upon earth. When our Lord
promises His presence to His Apostles He must
mean a kind of presence of a very much higher
and more personal order than that which fills
creation, and this can be nothing else than His
real and substantial presence as God and Man in
the Blessed Sacrament.
This was indeed the true and sufficient treasure
of the Church, which it was to possess in all
ages, and under all circumstances. "And they
were persevering in the doctrine of the Apostles,
and in the communication of the breaking of
bread, and in prayers " (Acts ii. 42). Such
was the life of the Apostles and their followers
when the Christian faith was first preached. Let
us hear what Saint Proclus says in the fifth
century : u After our Saviour was taken up
into heaven, the apostles, before being scattered
over the whole world, being together in oneness
of mind, passed whole days in prayer ; and
having found the mystic sacrifice of the Lord's
Body a great consolation, they sang it at very
great length ; for this, and teaching, they con
sidered preferable to anything else. . .
Through these prayers, therefore, they expected
the advent of the Holy Ghost, that by His own
Divine presence he might make and render the
The Treasure of the Church.
bread that lay there for a sacrifice and the wine
mixed with water, that very same body and
blood of our Lord Jesus Christ. Which is no
less done even to this day, and will be done even
to the consummation of the world " (Faith of
Catholics, Vol. ii. 505).
In the course of the fourth century these
prayers were embodied in the different liturgies
which have come down to us. These, it appears,
were derived from three great sources, which
were those of Saint James, of Saint Mark, and
the Roman Liturgy, which was that of Saint
Peter. The antiquity of these liturgies is shown
by the fact that they are still in use amongst the
sects which separated themselves from the
Church in the fifth century.
Nothing can show the great devotion of the
Church to the Holy Eucharist in a more striking
manner than these various liturgies. They
differ in language, and in ceremonies, as widely
as possible, and yet they agree in all essential
points, as well as in their tone of fervour and
devotion.
We may well say, then, that the Holy Eucharist
was recognised by the Church as its principal
treasure from the beginning. When times of
persecution came, the Church carried its treasure
with it into the catacombs, and continued to offer
sacrifice under ground. We read how the Mass
was celebrated on the tombs of the martyrs, and
the present law of the Church that Mass can only
be said on stone altars containing relics of the
8 The Treasure of the Church.
martyrs, seems to be a remembrance of those
days.
When persecution had passed away, the first
care of the Church was to provide fitting shrines
for her most sacred treasure, and soon the land
was covered with beautiful churches. Look at
the glorious cathedrals and beautiful parish
churches which are to be found everywhere in
our own land. Why were they made so beau
tiful ? Why was such a wealth of decoration
lavished upon them? Not to be meeting houses
of men — but to be the house of God, and the
shrine of the Blessed Sacrament.
This was a treasure which no man could take
from them. Men could, and did, destroy those
temples and desecrate those altars and call it a
crime to celebrate the Holy Sacrifice, and our
Lord once more went down into the catacombs.
Priests, in hiding and at the risk of their lives,
continued to offer the Holy Mass, and to give to
themselves and their flocks the great treasure
which our Lord had left them as their inherit
ance. And so, to-day, every missionary carries
with him this same treasure. He goes out,
perhaps, to a foreign land, as the Apostles did,
without " scrip or staff," exposing himself to
every danger, and he carries with him nothing
but the few things required for celebrating mass.
He is rich, however, because his Lord is always
with him : each day he can celebrate the Holy
Sacrifice and the Lord comes down upon the
altar to be his own food and solace, and to be
The Treasure of the Church.
the great gift which he can bestow upon his
converts.
The Blessed Sacrament is the treasure of the
Church, and also the treasure of every individual
soul. The Church does not come to men empty
handed. She has something to give which men
cannot give, and that is a close and personal
participation of the Divine Nature, in an
infinitely higher way than is to be found in the
rest of the creation.
If the Catholic Church could not do this, how
could she call herself a church in any reasonable
sense? If she came to men and said to them :
" I have nothing to give you but the words of
men ; I have nothing to bestow on you but what
you have already. I can pray and preach — and
so can anyone else. I do not profess to give
you any great supernatural gift — God is present
in my churches exactly as He is in your own
houses, and fields, and in no other way. I have
nothing supernatural to give you — nothing but
the words of men — or, at any rate, those Holy
Scriptures which you can read and interpret just
as well as I can."
If the Catholic Church had come to men
professing nothing but this, would the world
have paid any attention to her message ? Would
it have been reasonable that it should do so?
No. It was because the Church had a treasure
to bestow, which the world could not give, that
men attended to her, and acknowledged her
authority — and that treasure was the real
io The Treasure of the Church.
presence of our Lord, and the other sacramental
graces so closely connected with that presence.
Our Lord, God and Man, is the treasure ot
the Catholic Church and of every individual
soul : where our treasure is, there also our
hearts ought to be. " If thou didst know the
gift of God, and who it is that saith to thee, Give
me to drink, thou wouldst perhaps have asked
him, and he would have given thee living
water" (St. John iv. io). Our Lord is
Himself the great fountain supplying the needs
of His Church. Why do we not hurry to " draw
waters with joy out of the Saviour's fountains"
(Isa. xii. 3). Our Lord remains always in the
midst of us because His delight is to be with the
children of men ; should we not say with the
Psalmist — "What have I in heaven, and beside
thee what do I desire upon earth? For thee my
flesh and my heart hath fainted away ; thou
art the God of my heart, and the God that is
my portion for ever " (Ps. Ixxii. 25, 26).
The Blessed Sacrament is surrounded by
mysteries. It is most wonderful that the Lord
of glory should come down on the altar ; the
manner of His coming is a daily repeated
wonder ; the miraculous condition in which He
is sacramentally present is a wonder — and His
presence in a thousand different places at the
same moment is perhaps the most sublime
wonder of all.
Our Lord surrounds Himself in the Holy
Eucharist with wonders of power and of loving
The Treasure of the Church. n
humility. The perpetual miracle of Transub-
stantiation and the constant multiplication of
heavenly bread which He gives us are indeed
wonders of power ; but the wonders of humility
and love seem almost more wonderful still. To
think that God should hide Himself under the
most insignificant of species — that He should
take the shape of mere bread and wine is indeed
wonderful ; that He should put Himself com
pletely at the disposal of His creatures as if He
had no will of His own, is more wonderful
still. Yet so it is. His coming down on the
altar and remaining there is simply at the dis
cretion of poor sinful priests — and whilst He is
here, He is completely the servant of His
people. He is at the command of the poorest,
always ready to receive them ; He allows
Himself to be carried to the sick at all hours of
the day and night, of whatever sort they may
be. They may have been good or bad, saints
or hardened sinners, it makes no difference : our
Lord is ready to visit all and bestow on them the
comfort and support of His Sacramental
Presence.
The Blessed Sacrament is called, and may
well be called, "The mystery of Faith." It is
the mystery of Faith, because It is surrounded
with wonders which need our faith, and also
because It is the food of faith. No one can
receive the Holy Eucharist as he ought to receive
It without being constantly strengthened in his
faith. But we may add another reason for this
12 The Treasure of the Church.
name, and say it is the mystery of faith because
it is the test of faith, particularly in two things :
in the Incarnation, and in the authority of the
Catholic Church. It is on this point on which I
wish to dwell in this chapter.
We have seen with what wonders the Blessed
Sacrament is surrounded. Why should God
have worked all these miracles? Why should He
have come amongst men, and why should He
have come in so wonderful a way ? The answer is
a simple one. It is because the Blessed Sacra
ment is the carrying on, the completion, the
complement of His Incarnation, and so was
naturally surrounded by miracles of power and
love analogous to those which surrounded His
first coming upon earth.
Now what do we mean by the Incarnation ?
We mean that God became man ; that He took
to Himself a perfect human nature, body and
soul, so as to be henceforth and for evermore
God and man : — God walking on this earth ;
man reigning in heaven. And why did God
do this wonderful thing?
We have indeed no right to ask why it pleases
God to act in any way, as if we pretended to
pass judgment on Him. People sometimes say
in a cavilling spirit : " Why does God do this?
Why does His Providence allow that?" and so
forth. A Christian, of course, answers, " I do
not pretend to understand the reasons, the
objects, the consequences of what God does."
— " For who shall say to thee, Why hast thou
The Treasure of the Church. 13
done this?" (Wisd. xii.i2). " For as the heavens
are exalted above the earth, so are My ways
exalted above your ways, and My thoughts
above your thoughts, saith the Lord " (Isaias
IV.Q). If we could gauge, understand, and
reckon up His dealings, He would not be our
Creator and our God ; He would be one like
ourselves. We find it hard enough to under
stand the ways of our equals ; how absurd to
suppose we can comprehend the thoughts, the
dealings of the Infinite Creator of all things.
We may, however, try humbly to understand
His dealings with us — since He has deigned to
make us to His own image and likeness, and
to bestow upon us faculties which are a faint
reflection of His own infinite Intelligence.
Why then did He become incarnate? Because
we needed His Presence. By His own nature
God is infinitely removed from His creatures.
No creature, however great, can come near to
the Creator. There is an infinite and impassable
abyss which separates the Creator from His
creatures. Imagine to yourself all the excellences
and powers and faculties of creatures, a thousand
times multiplied, and they come no nearer to
Him. " Alps on Alps arise." You ascend a
lofty mountain, and one peak arises above
another till they seem to touch the clouds —
yet, when you have reached the highest, you
are, just as far off the sun as when you stood in
the plain. So, in a truer sense, when you have
exalted creatures to the utmost bounds of your
14 The Treasure of the Church
imagination, they are no nearer to the great
Creator, than the meanest thing on earth.
What creatures could not do, the Creator
deigned Himself to accomplish. They could
not come near to Him, so, in His tender love
for them, He Himself passed over that infinite
gulf, and came down to them. He chose to
take a place in His own creation, to be, in a
sense, a creature like them, and to put Himself
on their level.
This is the great work of the Incarnation. Its
first idea is that of " Emmanuel " (God with us) :
" And they shall call His name Emmanuel "
(St Matt. i. 23).
The great work of God made man for us poor
sinners is, without doubt, the work of our
Redemption : He came to redeem us with His
Precious Blood ; — but still, the primary idea of
the Incarnation is God with us : that the Creator
deigned to take a place in His creation and to
put Himself on a level with His creatures that
He might communicate Himself to them.
In His infinite \visdom, He saw that such a
communion with the Creator was necessary, in
a sense, for His intelligent creatures. They
had been made to His image, and so made sons
of God, and by that sonship they required a
special communication with His Godhead in a
way not given to the rest of creation. " Do not
become like the horse and the mule, which have
no understanding. With bit and bridle bind
fast their jaws, who come not near unto thee "
The Treasure of the Church. 15
(Ps. xxxi. 9). The horse and mule do not need to
come near to their Creator, but man must do so,
if he is to attain the state for which he was
intended. The Creator therefore came down on
earth, and took our shape, our nature, our
weakness, that He might "give to us to be
partakers of His Divinity " (cf. 2 Pet. i. 4).
But, we may say, Is not God everywhere ? Is
He not everywhere fully and completely with
His Divine essence — with His infinite power
and wisdom and love? Does not the Psalm I
have before quoted say : " If I ascend into
heaven thou art there ; if I descend into hell,
thou art present"? (Ps. cxxxviii. 8). Yes, God
is everywhere in the fullest conceivable manner.
" In Him we live and move, and have our
being " (Acts xvii. 28). In every blade of grass,
in every leaf that hangs on the tree, in every
insect that flits about in the summer sunshine,
there is the great Creator, "upholding all
things by the word of His power " (Heb. i. 3).
His presence is necessary that created things
may exist : " If thou turnest away thy face they
shall be troubled ; thou shalt take away their
breath, and they shall fail, and shall return to
their dust " (Ps. ciii. 29).
But, besides this universal presence of God,
there is a special presence, entirely different in
character, and far fuller and closer and more
personal. How this can be, is a mystery to us :
we are unable to understand how He can be
present perfectly in every place — and yet be
16 The Treasure of the Church.
more fully in some places than in others. But
it certainly is so. In some places and at some
times, He discloses Himself much more fully
and personally than at others — and He demands
suitable recognition of that presence. For
instance we are told that God walked with
Adam and Eve in the garden of Paradise at
certain times. He was there in a totally differ
ent sense from that in which He filled the
Universe. So, again, God spoke to Moses
from the burning bush, and said to him : " Come
not nigh hither, put off the shoes from thy feet ;
for the place whereon thou standest is holy
ground . . . Moses hid his face, for he durst
not look at God" (Exod. iii. 5, 6). And so, again,
Moses on Mount Sinai was in a special sense in
the presence of God, so that when he came down
from the mountain the children of Israel were
afraid to come near for the glory of His face.
Throughout the Old Testament, Almighty God
established a special presence of Himself on His
mercy seat, over the wings of the Cherubim.
" Thence will I give orders and will speak to
thee over the propitiatory, and from the midst
of the two Cherubim which shall be upon the
ark of the testimony " (Exod. xxv. 22). In all
these instances there was clearly a very special
presence, which admitted men to much closer
intercourse with their Creator than elsewhere,
and demanded from them a corresponding
acknowledgment and proportionate reverence.
" I will speak to my Lord, whereas I am dust
The Treasure of the Church.
and ashes " (Gen. xviii. 27). Such was the tone
of the patriarch when admitted to such a face-to-
face communication with God.
All these appearances, however wonderful as
they were, were but foreshadowings of that true
special presence by which the Creator was to
show Himself to man in the Incarnation. They
were only special manifestations of that general
Presence which filled the Universe, but this
was a really new and unheard of communication
of God to man ; in it the great God took to
Himself a created nature, and walked with man
on earth, and so opened to him the treasure of
His Divinity.
" The Word was made flesh, and dwelt amongst
us." (St. John. i. 14.) This was not to be a
passing manifestation of Himself, as many
visions had been. He came to stay amongst
men, to dwell with them, and make His home
amongst them. His home was first in the
stable of Bethlehem, and then in the holy house
of Nazareth. During His ministry, His home
is still in the midst of His people : though " the
foxes have holes and the birds of the air nests,
but the Son of man hath not where to lay
His head" (St. Matt. viii. 20). When the
end came again He dwelt with us. May we
not say that when He was laid in the grave,
He shared with us that last home of our
mortality !
Yes, the Lord came to dwell with His people,
to cheer and support them during this mortal
3
i8 The Treasure of the Church.
life, and to help them to gain their eternal
salvation.
But, if God came down to be with men, and
to communicate Himself to them ; if the primary
idea of the Incarnation is Emmanuel — God with
us ; may we not say that if the Incarnation
stands by itself His work seems incomplete?
He came on earth indeed, but He remained for
a very few years and then returned to His glory.
He was seen only in one very remote country,
far from the great centres of human habitation.
How were all the future ages of the world to
profit by His coming? How were distant lands
to benefit by His Presence? What special
blessing is it to me^ as far as His presence
is concerned, that God came down two
thousand years ago, and presently went away
again? God was upon earth, but He lived a
thousand miles away, how can I profit by His
presence ?
Yes, it seems to us, if we dare say so with
reverence, that the work was incomplete. What
God intended to do in His Incarnation was, in
part, left undone. But the moment we under
stand the mystery of Our Lord's real presence
in the Holy Eucharist, this incompleteness
vanishes, and we are able to see what seems
to us a perfect work. " I am with you all days,
even to the consummation of the world " (St. Matt,
xxviii. 20). These were our Lord's last words
to His disciples, and most effectually did
He carry out His promise. He removed,
The Treasure of the Church. 19
indeed, from them and us His visible presence,
but He instituted a Sacrament by which His
essential and real presence should always
remain. They were no longer, indeed, to see
His face or hear His voice, but that special
presence of the Godhead, which it was the
object of the Incarnation to bring upon
earth, was continued to men till the end of
time. It can no longer be said that the
Almighty gave us Himself, and then withdrew
His gift. For two thousand years His Presence
has been with men, and generation after genera
tion has rejoiced in it. It can no longer be
said that this Presence is confined to a remote
corner of the earth, because by this Sacrament
He lives at once in all parts of the globe.
" Emmanuel, God with us": that was the
great gift bestowed by the Incarnation — and
brought home to each individual by the real
presence of Our Lord in the Holy Sacrament
of the altar.
May we not say, with perfect truth, that the
Real Presence makes the doctrine of the In
carnation infinitely easier to understand? These
two mysteries taken together, give us the
grandest and most sublime idea that we can
conceive of the dealings of God with His
creatures. Wonderful to think that, in this
great Sacrament, He should have brought His
Incarnation home to us in all ages and in all
places. He gives Himself to all without dis
tinction, to rich and poor, to young and old ; to
20 The Treasure of the Church.
the child just beginning life, and to the poor
sinner about to depart on his last journey, as
well as to be the daily food of His priests to
enable them to carry out the great ministry
entrusted to them.
We may well say, with St. John Chrysostom,
" Where is the shepherd which feedeth His
flock with His own blood? Nay, why should
I say shepherd ? Many mothers there are, who
after all the pains of travail give their little ones
to strangers to nurse. But so would not He,
but feedeth us with His own Blood, and maketh
us to grow up in His own substance." (6th
lesson, Sunday, oct. of Corpus Christi. Marquis
of Bute's translation.)
" Feedeth us with His own Blood " : strange
this seems to those who have not thought of
the glorified and supernatural condition of that
Body and Blood. " How can this man give us
His flesh to eat " (St. John vi. 53), they would say
with the men of Capharnaum, not understanding
that they are receiving their living Lord, whole
and glorified. He has chosen this means of com
municating Himself to men, because it is the
closest and most intimate way of union possible.
By this He comes home to each individually,
makes Himself the property of each, and makes
each one a sharer of His Incarnation to a degree
which would be inconceivable in any other way.
The Blessed Sacrament is, as I said, called
the Sacrament of Faith, and it may well be
called so, because it is especially the test of
The Treasure of the Church, 21
our faith in the Incarnation. If people do not
believe in the Incarnation, or have never realised
what it means, the real presence of our Lord
in the Holy Eucharist is obviously an impossi
bility ; we might almost say an absurdity. If
our Lord was not truly God and Man — that is,
if Almighty God never came on earth — how can
there be any such presence in the Eucharist?
On the other hand, if you really believe that
God was incarnate, and was visibly present in
the stable of Bethlehem, and hanging on the
cross, there is no great difficulty in also believing
that He is still continuing the same presence
in the Holy Eucharist.
So far from being a difficulty, the two mys
teries illustrate one another. The Blessed
Sacrament as the completion of the Incarnation
throws a flood of light on the original mystery.
It is mysterious and wonderful indeed, but it
gives us a much more intelligible view of God's
merciful dealings with His people than can be
obtained in any other way.
People may say, indeed, that the Holy Euchar
ist is surrounded with wonders ; that it is full
of mysteries difficult for the human mind to
conceive. How could it be the continuation of
our Lord's Incarnation, and not be mysterious?
God's coming upon earth was the greatest of all
wonders, and the perpetuation of the presence
cannot be otherwise than mysterious. We shall
find, however, that the mysteries of the one are
extremely analogous to those of the other ;
22 The Treasure of the Church.
indeed, we may say that the same wonders
occur, only varied by circumstances.
Let us go a little more fully into this interest
ing point. Now, first, let us ask what is the
thing that most strikes the imagination when
considering our Lord's Incarnation. Look at
Jesus in the stable, God and Man. In Him is
concentrated the fulness of the Godhead. That
Divinity which is immense, boundless, beyond
all human calculation, is, as it were, localized,
confined to that poor grotto. The presence
which is everywhere in its fulness, which is
essential to the existence of this vast creation,
is to be found wholly and fully present in a
personal way in the form of that sacred Infant.
He Who had no beginning ; Who by the
necessity of His Being was from eternity, never
theless was on Christmas night a newly-born
Infant. " Omnipotence in bonds." He to whom
all things belonged, was dependent on His
creatures. These are the most striking of the
wonders of the Incarnation. Do they not con
found our ideas of time and space? Do they not
bring home to us how little we really know of
these things of which we talk so glibly? I may
venture, perhaps, to quote a few lines from
Cardinal Newman which seem to bear on this.
In the Dream of Gerontius, the angel addressing
the departed soul speaks thus :
" Thou livest in a world of signs and types,
The presentations of most holy truths,
Living and strong1, which now encompass thee ;
The Treasure of the Church. 23
And thou art wrapped and swathed around in dreams,
Dreams that are true yet enigmatical . . .
And thus thou tell'st of space and time and size,
As — (let me use similitude of earth
To aid thee in the knowledge thou dost ask) —
As ice which blisters may be said to burn."
We experience certain effects, and form ideas
about things for ourselves, but, as to what the
things are in themselves, as to their real causes,
or their manner of existing we are quite ignorant.
This central wonder, that God is present per
sonally in a distinct, visible form, is also the
special marvel of the Blessed Sacrament. You
see the Sacred Host, how is it possible that in
that small compass can be contained the Infinite
Godhead? It is in one sense a greater marvel
than the Incarnation, since this Godhead is
visible in this veiled manner in a thousand places.
Yes, but it is, in a sense, less marvellous,
because His manner of existence and manner of
action is entirely hidden from us — whereas during
His mortal life, we have the Divine Word,
acting, speaking and suffering like ourselves.
Again the marvel of the Incarnation is the
way in which God became man.
"While all things were in quiet silence and
night was in the midst of her swift course,
Thine Almighty Word, O God, leaped down
from Heaven out of Thy Royal Throne "
(cf. Wisdom xviii. 15). "He came unto His
own, and His own received Him not" (St. John
i. 11). The world went on its way, and knew
24 The Treasure oj the Church.
not at all of the great thing that had come to pass
in the midst of it. This same wonder meets us
every moment in the Blessed Sacrament. Go into
a quiet church where a few worshippers are
round the altar as the Mass is said, far from the
bustling world ; — there again the Lord of Glory
comes down into the midst of them. His
coming is as silent and unknown as when on
Christmas night He was born into the world.
Again, it is more wonderful, because happening
in a thousand places, — but less wonderful in as
far as there is so little externally to strike the
senses.
We may well say, then, that the Blessed
Sacrament is the continuation and complement
of the Incarnation. God has given us this
wonderful Sacrament to carry out the ends for
which He became Incarnate, and His presence
in the Blessed Sacrament is surrounded by
wonders and difficulties which correspond
exactly with the wonders and difficulties of the
Incarnation.
CHAPTER II.
NATURE AND METHOD OF THIS PRESENCE.
The Substance. — Christ verily and indeed. — The Hypostatic
Union. — His supernatural and glorified state. — The
Accidents. — What our senses perceive. — Our inference
at fault. — Transubstantiation. — St. Thomas Aquinas. —
Real Presence and Transubstantiation two distinct ques
tions. — Canterbury and York. — Development of dogmatic
expression. — W. H. Mallock. — Mystery of faith, not o
sig-ht.
IN the last chapter I was speaking of the Blessed
Sacrament generally, and I tried to take a broad
and extensive view of the pre-eminent position
which this Sacrament holds in the Catholic
Church.
It is the means by which Our Lord makes
His Incarnation present in every age, and brings
the benefits of it home to each generation. It
is the treasure of the Catholic Church and also
of each individual soul.
We may even say that the Church itself was
established upon earth in order to be the
Guardian of this Great Sacrament, and to enable
the faithful to receive it as they ought.
26 The Treasure of the Church.
I must now go on, however, to consider more
carefully the details of the Sacrament of the
Holy Eucharist, and for this purpose I take the
words of the catechism which is taught to all
our children.
The catechism says: "The Sacrament of
the Holy Eucharist is the true Body and Blood
of Jesus Christ, together with His Soul and
Divinity, under the appearances of bread and
wine." The word "true" is here used because
the first thing is to establish, beyond the possi
bility of doubt, the reality of our Lord's
presence : that He is present " verily and indeed."
Outside the Catholic Church the opinions of
men about our Lord's presence are very vague,
and no power on earth except the Catholic Church
dares to give a clear and authoritative decision
on the subject. You hear people talk of a figur
ative presence ; or they say that our Lord is
present in the Blessed Sacrament "spiritually"
and not "carnally"; He that is received by
Faith ; and so forth.
The catechism begins therefore by telling us
that it is the "true Body and Blood of Jesus
Christ." It is not any mere representation—
called the Body of Christ, as a picture or a statue
might, in a sense, be so called. You might, for
instance, speak of the Body of our Lord on the
cross, when you were describing a crucifix ; — but
here is the true Body ; — not a new Incarnation,
but that very same Body which was crucified
for us.
The Treasure of the Church. 27
" Ave, verum corpus natum
De Maria Virgine ;
Vere passum, immolatum
In cruce pro homine :
Cujus latus perforatum
Unda fluxit cum sanguine."
"Hail, true Body, born of the Virgin Mary,
which truly suffered and was immolated on the
cross : from Whose pierced side the tide of Blood
and Water came forth."
" His soul and His Divinity." We here come
to the crucial point of the whole doctrine, and
have brought before as most fully the doctrine of
the " Hypostatic Union." Almighty God took to
Himself our human nature in so perfect a
manner that His two natures could not possibly
be separated. The Athanasian Creed says that
our Lord was " Perfect God, and perfect man,
subsisting of a reasonable soul and human flesh.
Equal to the Father according to His Godhead,
and less than the Father according to His
manhood. Who although He be both God and
Man, yet He is not two, but one Christ. One,
not by the conversion of the Godhead into flesh,
but by the taking of the manhood unto God. One
altogether not by confusion of substance, but by
unity of person. For as the rational soul and
the flesh is one man, so God and man is one
Christ."
The Holy Sacrament brings this Hypostatic
Union most distinctly before you. You receive
the Blessed Sacrament under both kinds or
28 The Treasure of the Church.
under either kind — but in all cases you receive
our Lord, wholly and entirely, in His Divine
and human nature, and you cannot possibly
receive more. If you do not believe this, you
have no real belief at all in the Presence of our
Lord in the Holy Sacrament.
It was for this reason that, in the middle ages,
the Church was so stern in refusing the " Utra-
quist party " permission to receive Communion
under both forms. It was not merely a question
of discipline, because it soon became evident
that the desire to receive in that way arose from
an imperfect and erroneous belief as to the
doctrine taught by the Church.
We receive that very Body which suffered for
us ; but in what condition, and in what state of
existence is that Sacred Body? " How can this
man give us his flesh to eat?" (St. John vi. 53).
This was the question put by the people that
heard Him promise this Sacrament to men.
They had not confidence and patience to wait
and see how He intended to carry out His
wonderful promise. They did not understand
that He was going to give them, not a mortal,
suffering Body, but one that was immortal and
impassible. He was to give Himself truly and
really, but in a supernatural and glorified state.
The exact condition of a glorified body is a
thing which we cannot understand. Our Lord
says : u See my hands and feet, that it is I
myself ; handle and see ; for a spirit hath not
flesh and bones as you see me to have " (St. Luke
The Treasure of the Church. 29
xxiv. 39). He was not a spirit, therefore, and yet
our Lord " stood in the midst of them when the
doors were shut " (St. John xx. 26). St. Paul speaks
of a spiritual body— that is, a body which in its
qualities and state of existence resembles a
spirit. We have no experience of such a body,
and cannot in the least picture it to our imagi
nations. It is no longer subject to the laws of
this nature, and is no longer bounded or
controlled by considerations of space or time.
St. Ambrose says : " We see here the
marvellous nature of the Lord's glorified Body.
It could enter unseen, and then become seen.
It could easily be touched, but Its nature is hard
to understand. The disciples were affrighted,
and supposed that they had seen a spirit. And
therefore the Lord, that He might show the
evidence of His Resurrection, said : * Handle
and see ; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones as
ye see Me to have ' (St. Luke xxiv. 39). There
fore it was not by being in a disembodied
state, but by the peculiar qualities of the risen
and glorified Body that He had passed through
closed doors. For that which is touched or
handled is a body." (ist Lesson, Easter Tuesday.)
This consideration is the simple answer to a
great many of the difficulties which strike the
imagination with regard to the Blessed Sacra
ment. How is it possible that our Lord can
have left Himself at the mercy of men ; — so that
the sacred Species might be profaned by
unbelievers? How can we suppose that He
30 The Treasure of the Church.
could allow His Body and Blood to be cast out
on the wayside — or even trampled under foot
by His enemies? Why ? Because, in His
Sacramental Presence, His glorified Body is
absolutely beyond all injury. He passes through
the hands of men uninjured, as He passed
through the crowd of Jews during His mortal
life. "And they brought Him to the brow of
the hill, whereon their city was built, that they
might cast Him down headlong. But He,
passing through the midst of them, went His
way " (St. Luke iv. 29, 30).
No attempt of man can in the least injure
Him or affect His royal state : their malice only
recoils on themselves. Unbelievers seem to
delight in imagining all sorts of risks or con
ditions of dishonour to which the Holy Eucharist
might be exposed. They seem to forget that to
the glorified humanity of our Lord all external
and physical conditions are absolutely indifferent.
To the Creator of all things, the dust of the
road is as good and as precious as the most
splendid tabernacle of gold and jewels ever
made by mortal hands. We offer Him
these things, and rightly ; but it is because
they are precious in our sight, not in His.
One thing only can injure Him, and that is
sin, and sin only injures Him in the sense
that it ruins the souls which He loves so
much.
When the Blessed Sacrament is broken, St.
Thomas tells us :
The Treasure of the Church. 31
" Nulla rei fit scissura :
Signi tantum fit fractura :
Qua nee status nee statura
Signati minuitur."
" Of the substance is no rending-,
For the sign alone is broken ;
None the less the state and stature
Of the substance signed remains." —
Bishop Bagshawe's translation.
The Church takes the greatest care to prevent
any disrespect to the Holy Sacrament, because
it is her duty so to honour Him — not because
she thinks that He can suffer injury or needs
her care.
" Under the appearances or bread and wine."
By appearances we mean all those properties ot
which our senses are able to take note. The
correct name for these properties is " accidents"
— by which term we mean all those qualities
which are appreciable by our senses. St.
Thomas sums up these in the words :
" Visus, tactus, gustus in Te fallitur,
Sed auditu solo tuto creditur."
" Taste, Touch, and Sight in Thee are deceived,
But the Hearing alone may be safely believed."
We say that the senses are deceived, as St.
Thomas does in the verse above quoted, but
this is not really correct. The senses cannot
possibly tell of anything except sensible qualities,
and do not pretend to explain what is hidden
under these externals. The substance itself is
quite beyond us.
32 The Treasure of the Church.
Cardinal Newman, speaking of the Blessed
Sacrament and Transubstantiation, says: "It
is difficult, impossible to imagine, I grant, but
how is it difficult to believe ? . . . For
myself, I cannot indeed prove it, I cannot tell
how it is ; but I say, Why should not it be ?
What's to hinder it? What do I know of sub
stance or matter? Just as much as the greatest
philosophers, and that is nothing at all. . . .
The Catholic doctrine leaves phenomena alone.
It does not say that the phenomena go : on the
contrary it says they remain : nor does it say
that the same phenomena are in several places
at once. It deals with what no one on earth
knows anything about, the material substances
themselves." — Apologia p. 375.
The account given by our senses, then, is
perfectly correct : — it is our inference from this
account which is deceived, because by the power
of God, a new and supernatural substance,
namely the substance of the Body and Blood
of Christ, is put before us, in place of that
substance which these accidents usually in
dicate.
"Under the appearances of bread and wine."
Why did our Lord choose to hide His glory
under these lowly forms ? He came to be our
food, and therefore must hide Himself under
forms most fitted to be our food. He came to
spread His presence widely amongst men, and
therefore He chose the simplest and commonest
food, that which was within reach of all men.
The Treasure of the Church. 33
But oh, how wonderful ! The Creator of all
things, hidden under such lowly forms !
"VERBUM CARO PANEM VERUM
VERBO CARNEM EFFICIT :
FITQUE SANGUIS CHRISTI MERUM,
ET SI SENSUS DEFICIT
AD FIRMANDUM COR SINCERUM
SOLA FIDES SUFFICIT."
"The Word made Flesh makes very Bread
Become true Flesh by His one word,
And wine is made the Blood of Christ :
And if weak sense is not assured,
True faith unto the heart sincere
Most firm assurance can afford. "-
Bishop Bagshaive's translation.
" Bread and wine." The Western Church uses
bread in its simplest and most primitive form :
that is, unleavened bread. This, however, is
merely a matter of discipline, and in the Eastern
Ritual leavened bread is used for Holy Mass.
All that is necessary for the Sacrament is that
the bread and wine should be real bread and
wine, that is, bread made from wheat, and wine
which is the juice of the grape.
"The bread and wine are changed into the
Body and Blood of Christ, by the power of God,
when the words of Consecration are pronounced
by the priest at the Mass."
At every Mass the priest consecrates and
receives the Holy Eucharist himself ; and also,
when necessary, consecrates, so that the Blessed
34 The Treasure of the Church.
Sacrament may be given to the faithful for their
food and reserved in the tabernacle for their
adoration.
In the Blessed Sacrament there are two
striking wonders : the perpetually renewed pres
ence of our Lord by Transubstantiation, and
the perpetual multiplication of this presence,
by which our Lord is on a thousand altars at
one and the same time. We cannot fancy any
greater wonders, and yet both miracles are
absolutely necessary in order to carry out the
end and aim of the Institution of the Holy
Eucharist. Without this perpetual renewal of
the Sacred Species, the Presence of God Incar
nate could not have been kept on earth for all
these centuries ; and without the multiplication
of this presence, our Lord could never have
brought His Incarnation home to the millions
scattered over the face of the earth.
There are two miracles in our Lord's life
which specially illustrate these great wonders.
One of these is the miracle of Cana in Galilee,
and the other the feeding of the 5,000 people in
the desert. The first miracle which Jesus worked
in the sight of men was the changing of the
water into wine ; the last, before His Passion,
was the changing the bread and wine into His
Body and Blood. In both cases the miracle was
one of transubstantiation ; that wonderful act of
divine power which is like nothing else than
creation.
The miracle of the marriage feast is a strikingly
The Treasure of the Church. 35
appropriate type and forerunner of the Holy
Eucharist. The Blessed Sacrament is, as we
have shown, the special means by which God
is united to His Church. We may consider the
Last Supper as the great marriage feast of the
espousals of Christ with His Church. "With
desire have I desired to eat this Pasch with you
before I suffer" (St. Luke xxii. 15). Why this
great desire? His desire was expressed in His
burning words : " How am I straightened till
it be accomplished " (St. Luke xii. 50). It was
not merely a leave-taking, but it was the com
plete union with His apostles, for which He
longed, through which He was to be espoused
for ever to His Church.
Again, we may say that Our Lord went to that
marriage feast to join in the festivities of His
creatures, to consecrate them by His presence.
Religion was not to be a thing of gloom in
which every joyous feeling was to be suppressed,
and to show us this He worked His first
miracle.
What better illustration can there be of that
joyous Eucharistic feast to which Our Lord
invites us in Holy Communion? Its very name
Eucharist means thanksgiving, and in it we are
sitting down to that great and glorious banquet
in which we are fellow guests with the angels.
I hope it may not be fanciful to say that as
Our Lord by His word changed water into wine,
so in the Holy Eucharist He is prepared to
change all our weak and imperfect aspirations
36 The Treasure of the Church.
into something valuable in the sight of God, by
the infusion of His Divine Presence.
The miracle of feeding the five thousand in
the desert illustrates the other striking wonder of
the Holy Eucharist. We adore our Lord in
one of our churches, and then, when we have
gone a short distance, we find Him waiting for
us again in another — the same Lord and God,
surrounded by the same awful and invisible
court.
How can this be? How can the human mind
accept so marvellous a Presence ?
To understand it a little, see Jesus in the
desert surrounded by a vast multitude. lie
blesses those few loaves, and they are multiplied
till they suffice for the nourishment of all.
" I have compassion on the multitudes . . . lest
they faint in the way " (St. Matt. xv. 32). Is not
this the very motive of the Holy Eucharist,
4 'lest they faint in the way;" not the short
journey through the desert, but our long pil
grimage to the shores of eternal life?
We may moreover point another resemblance,
and this applies also to the miracle of the
marriage feast. It was the power of God
Incarnate that worked the miracles, but in both
cases it was by the hands of men : " He blessed
and brake and gave the loaves to His disciples,
and the disciples to the multitudes " (St. Matt,
xiv. 19).
The same we see in the other miracle : " Draw
out now, and carry to the chief steward of the
The Treasure of the Church. 37
feast " (St. John ii. 8). Is not this an anticipation
of the way in which our Lord leaves His
Precious Body to His priests, to be multiplied
in their hands till all His faithful have their fill?
St. Thomas Aquinas says : " O how precious a
thing, then, how marvellous, how health-giving,
how furnished with all dainties, is the supper of
the Lord ! Than His supper can anything be
more precious? Therein is put before us for
meat, not as of old times, the flesh of bulls and
of goats, but Christ Himself our very God.
Than this Sacrament can anything be more
marvellous? Therein it cometh to pass that
bread and wine are bread and wine no more, but
in the stead thereof there is the Body and there
is the Blood of Christ : that is to say, Christ
Himself, Perfect God and Perfect Man : Christ
Himself is there under the appearances of a
little bread and wine. All that the senses
can reach in this Sacrament — (look, taste, feel,
smell, and the like) — all these abide of bread and
wine, but the thing is not bread and wine." ($th
lesson, Corpus Chris ft.)
In these words St. Thomas Aquinas lays down
most clearly the Catholic doctrine of Transub-
stantiation, that is the changing of the substance
of bread and wine into the substance of His
own Body and Blood, which takes place when
the words of Consecration are pronounced.
This doctrine is one of the points of the Catholic
Faith most strenuously attacked.
"Transubstantiation," say the Thirty-nine
38 The Treasure of the Church.
Articles, " is repugnant to the plain words of
Scripture, overthroweth the nature of a Sacra
ment, and hath given occasion to many super
stitions " (Art. 28).
Transubstantiation, however, is the only
doctrine that gives us a plain and clear notion of
what the Holy Eucharist is. In all the other
views put forward : in the idea that our Lord is
there by Consubstantiation, that is, that the sub
stance of the bread and our Lord's Body are
present at the same time : in the idea that our
Lord is present with those who believe, and not
present with those who do not : in all these,
there is a great degree of vagueness. Those
who hold them do not seem to have quite made up
their minds as to what they believe. Transubstan
tiation, moreover, is the only doctrine which
exactly corresponds with the words of Institution.
Our Lord does not say : " Here is my Body," but
"this is my Body": that is, " this very thing
which I hold in my hand, is my Body."
The doctrine of Transubstantiation is, however,
in one sense, a secondary question. It concerns
the way in which our Lord is present in the
Holy Eucharist, and it is useless to discuss this
unless we are agreed as to the reality of His
Presence.
Hence it was that in their letter to the
Archbishops of Canterbury and York, the
Catholic bishops so carefully avoided all con
troversy about Transubstantiation, and confined
themselves to asking their Graces whether they
The Treasure of the Church. 39
did or did not believe in the real objective
presence of our Lord in the Holy Eucharist.
If our Lord is really and actually present in the
Sacred Species in a way in which He is not
present anywhere else on earth, it matters
comparatively little in what manner He is
present. It is indeed a great question for
theologians and philosophers, and one in which
we must most carefully follow the teaching of
the Church — but, in whatever way He is present,
that Presence must be equally mysterious and
wonderful to us.
It is said that this doctrine was introduced by
Schoolmen at a late period of Church history,
because very little explicit mention of it is found
in earlier writings. This, however, only shows
the complete unanimity of the Church. It is
not as if earlier ages could have ignored or been
indifferent to the Divine mysteries. All Chris
tians had constantly before them the burning
words of the Liturgy ; and the Mass, more than
anything else, entered into their daily lives ; and
yet no single controversy arose about it. It was
not because people were not sufficiently ready to
dispute on such subjects. For instance, the
schismatic Greeks made the question of leavened
or unleavened bread — which is, after all, only a
question of discipline — the ground of an intense
hatred against the Latins. Even in their ex
tremity, when Constantinople was on the point
of falling into the hands of the Turks, they cried
out : " Away with the worship of the Azymites "
40 The Treasure of the Church.
— that is, those who use unleavened bread. So,
again, a great schism arose on the question of
receiving Holy Communion under both kinds.
About Transubstantiation, however, no word of
controversy was raised, and the term was at once
adopted as expressing the faith of all Christians.
At that time, and at the present moment, there
is not the slightest difference of doctrine between
Catholics and the Greek Church.
People say that theologians, writing on the
Blessed Sacrament, go into a vast number of
questions which seem unnecessary. This is
true of the Holy Eucharist, and of all other
doctrines. We must remember, however, that
these doctrines had been believed for ages, and,
we may say, were deep in the hearts of the
faithful long before theologians began to discuss
them. It is the nature of the human mind to
analyse its thoughts, and the accurate analysis
worked out by theologians is a most striking
testimony to the fulness and accuracy of the
faith already believed.
J
I will here quote a passage from a non-Catholic
writer which appears to me very true and very
striking : —
" According to ordinary Protestant opinion,
the doctrines of the Church of Rome represent
a structure built up by the misguided ingenuity
of priests, and imposed by them on a credulous
and passive laity ; but the truth, in reality, is
exactly the reverse of this. It is the world of
ordinary believers that has imposed its belief on
The Treasure of the Church. 41
the priests, not the priests that have imposed
theirs on the world of ordinary believers. Let
us take, for example, the Roman doctrine of the
Eucharist, or the belief implied in the cultus of
the Virgin Mary. That the sacramental elements
were actually the body and blood of Christ : that
the Redeemer Who died on the Cross for each
individual sinner, entered under the form of
these elements into each sinner's body — entered,
bearing the stripes on it by which the sinner
was healed, and mixing with the sinner's blood
the Divine blood that had been shed for him :
this was the belief of the common unlettered
communicant long before priests and theologians
had, by the aid of Aristotle, explained the
assumed miracle as a process of Transubstantia-
tion ; and longer still before the philosophic
explanation was, by the ratification of any
General Council, given its place among the
definite teachings of the Church.
44 Similarly, the devotion to the Virgin Mary
first sprung up among the mass of believers
naturally because the idea of God's mother, with
all her motherly love, with all her virgin purity,
and with all her human sorrows, allied so closely
to omnipotence, touched countless hearts in a
way which was in all cases practically similar ;
just as the offer of a helping hand would make
a similar appeal to each one of a multitude of
men drowning.
" The official teaching ot Rome with regard
to the Virgin's sinlessness, and the degree of
42 The Treasure of the Church.
worship which is her due, has been the work, no
doubt, of the few, not of the many, of priests,
of theologians, of councils. But the doctrines
they have thus defined have not been fabricated
by themselves. The doctrines have had their
origin in the pious opinions which have spon
taneously shaped themselves in the minds of
innumerable Christians, as the result of a multi
tude of independent spiritual experiences.
Gradually theologians have reduced these to
logical and coherent forms ; and at last they
have been submitted to one great representative
Council. This Council, which, according to the
Roman theory, is guarded from error by the
spiritual assistance of the Holy Spirit, considers
how far these doctrines are consistent with the
doctrines already defined, and with one another ;
and how far, explicitly or implicitly, there is any
warrant for them in the Scriptures. It ends
with rejecting some, while others are harmonised
and affirmed by it ; and then these last are added
to the authoritative teaching of the Church."
(" Doctrine and Doctrinal Disruption," by W.
H. Mallock).
This passage might at first sight be supposed
to imply that these doctrines about the Blessed
Sacrament and the Blessed Virgin were mere
inventions of the populace, which had by degrees
been absorbed into the Catholic faith. I do not
think the author means this, and certainly it is
not the case. Truths were revealed to men, but
they were living truths, and not mere proposi-
The Treasure of the Church. 43
tions. The moment these truths were planted in
the minds and hearts of men — that is, as soon as
men realised them — they began to expand just
as a living seed does, and to produce irresistibly
those beliefs and feelings which really are con
tained in them. When people get hold of a
living principle, true or false, they do not gener
ally see at once all that is contained in that
principle, although the logical deductions are
sure to make themselves manifest by degrees.
It was so in the truths revealed to the early
Christians. It is very likely that they did not
at once recognise all the consequences following
from the great truths they had so lovingly
accepted, and which were so near to their hearts,
but they were there as certainly as the leaves
and buds are in the seed. In due time they
must make their appearance, and the Church,
inspired by the Holy Ghost, at once recognised
them as genuine developments of the Faith
once delivered to the Saints, and defined them
accordingly.
The early Christians received the doctrine of
our Lord's real presence in the Holy Eucharist,
and probably did not think it necessary to con
sider very closely the manner in which He was
present. When, in after ages, they could give
time and thought to the question, it became very
clear that the doctrine of Transubstantiation was
the only teaching consistent with what the
Church had always believed.
It is conceivable that our Lord might have
44 The Treasure of the Church.
chosen to be present in the Holy Eucharist in
some other way ; but this seems clear, that there
never has been any real and steady belief in the
objective presence of our Lord, except amongst
those who believed in Transubstantiation.
For example, Luther taught that our Lord
was really present in the Holy Eucharist by what
was called Consubstantiation — that our Lord was
present, and that the substance of bread was
also there.
The belief in the Real Presence amongst
Lutherans, however, has always been the faintest
and poorest shadow of a faith that can be con
ceived. All devotion to the Real Presence has
practically died out from amongst them long
ago, although there is some theoretical belief to
be found in their books. So, again, the words
of the English Prayer Book express belief in
the Real Presence, though they are so bitter
against Transubstantiation. Yes, but how much
reality is there in this belief? At this moment,
no human being can tell whether the Church of
Englandbelievesina realobjective presenceor not.
The Blessed Sacrament abounds in miracles.
In whichever way we look at it, it is full of mys
teries — mysteries both of power and of love.
But, perhaps it may be objected that these
miracles which we cannot see ought to have
some external indication. Is it not reasonable
to expect that when such a mighty change has
been effected, and these poor elements have
become nothing less than the body and blood of
The Treasure of the Church. 45
the Incarnate Word — is it not reasonable to
expect some outward change, something to show
us that a great miracle has been worked under
our eyes ?
That is how men would naturally argue. A
moment's reflection, however, is enough to show
that this could not be. A perpetual miracle,
always visible to the eyes of men, would entirely
disarrange the plans which God has laid down
for the human race: "We walk by faith, and
not by sight" (2 Cor. v. 7). If we could see
miracles whenever we pleased, there would be
an end of faith : we should then walk by sight ;
and so the whole of the system which God has
appointed for the human race would be set aside.
Miracles may, and, in fact, do happen occasion
ally without producing this effect : to mankind
at large these miracles themselves are a matter
of faith, which they cannot verify at pleasure.
It would not be so with miracles happening
regularly. If, for instance, every time we heard
Mass or assisted at Benediction, we were favoured
with the sight of our Lord's glorified body as it
is, or of some distinctly heavenly sign, there
would be no more room for faith.
We say, then, that our Lord does not give us
any outward sign whatever of the mystery of
transubstantiation because, if He had done so,
the whole economy of the present world would
have been altered, faith would have ceased to
exist, and, moreover, devotion and love would
have ceased to be valuable. If now we show
46 The Treasure of the Church.
love and tenderness to our Lord in the Blessed
Sacrament, if we treat Him reverently and serve
Him heartily, He graciously accepts our service
as valuable because it is offered through faith.
If, however, we could see Him in His glory
with our mortal eyes, it certainly would be no
merit if, " falling down, we adored Him." How
could we help doing so !
This is beautifully illustrated by the story of
St. Louis of France, which I daresay you have
often heard. The story is that the King was
praying in a church, when a miraculous appear
ance took place. The people ran to tell the
King of this heavenly vision which was vouch
safed to them ; but he replied : 4t Let those go
and see who do not believe. I will not go,
because our Lord has said, ' Blessed are those
who have not seen, and yet believe.'' These
last words ought always to be in our minds, and
ought to make us feel how great is the gift our
Lord has bestowed upon us in His Eucharistic
Presence.
Let us conclude with the words of St. Thomas's
hymn :
ADORO TE DEVOTE LATENS DEITAS,
QUAE SUB HIS FIGURIS VERE LATITAS ;
TIBI SE COR MEUM TOTUM SUBJICIT ;
QUIA TE CONTEMPLANS TOTUM DEFICIT.
" I worship Thee devoutly, Who dost hide
Within these figures, hidden Deity ;
And utterly subject my heart to Thee,
To comprehend Thee, failing1 utterly."
CHAPTER IIL
THE GIFT CONVEYED TO MAN. — HOLY COM
MUNION. — PREPARATION OF SOUL.
Our capacity for receiving- grace. — "Discerning the Body of
the Lord." — Who is there. — The treatment He deserves. —
What the Church of England thinks. — Why He comes. —
"Let a man prove himself.'11 — Sin, its nature and
kinds. — The crime of Judas. — Gravel in the wheels. —
Essence of Mortal sin. — Grace, its meaning- and
kinds. — The helping- hand. — The wedding- g-arment. —
Sacrament of Penance, the Divinely appointed " proof. "-
"Compulsory Confession " and "Ecclesiastical domina
tion."
I NOW come to the conditions for receiving the
Holy Eucharist worthily. The Catechism says :
" In order to receive the Blessed Sacrament
worthily, it is required that we should be in a
state of grace, and fasting from midnight."
The best preparation for Holy Communion is,
obviously, a good life. If you are honestly
trying to love and serve God, and that not only
on special occasions, but habitually, then your
life is a perpetual preparation for Holy Com
munion. But if you are not really trying to
48 The Treasure of the Church.
save your soul, it is very difficult to be well
prepared. The very idea of the Holy Sacrament
is that it is to support you in your journey
through the wilderness to the promised land ;
but if you are not in earnest in making that
journey, you cannot expect the Divine food to
profit you much.
The hearth-cake which the angel brought to
Elias is taken as a type of the Blessed Sacra
ment. The angel said to him : " Arise, eat : for
thou hast yet a great way to go. And he arose,
and eat, and drank, and walked in the strength
of that food forty days and forty nights, unto
the Mount of God " (3 Kings xix. 7, 8). The food
is given for a special purpose, and the strength
it gives corresponds with the energy displayed
in carrying out that purpose.
Besides this general preparation, however, a
special preparation is needed, and on the excel
lence of this preparation the effect of the Sacra
ment in a great degree depends.
The sacraments give grace directly by Divine
appointment — that is, they are like fountains,
pouring out water abundantly and spontaneously
for all who approach them. They fill all who
come to them certainly, but fill them in propor
tion to their capacity for receiving.
You can illustrate this by the miracle of the
prophet Eliseus, told us in the fourth book of
Kings. A poor woman said to him : "I thy
handmaid have nothing in my house but a little
oil to anoint me. And he said to her : Go, borrow
The Treasure of the Church. 49
of all thy neighbours empty vessels not a few. . .
So the woman went, and shut the door upon
her, and upon her sons : they brought her
the vessels and she poured in. And when the
vessels were full, she said to her son : Bring me
yet a vessel. And he answered : I have no
more. And the oil stood " (4 Kings iv. 2).
The grace which our Lord gives in the Sacra
ments depends upon our capacity for receiving.
When there is no more room, the oil stands.
The capacity we have for receiving God's grace
depends largely upon our diligence in preparing
ourselves to receive the Sacraments.
The first and most remarkable of all the in
structions for Holy Communion is that given
by St. Paul in his first Epistle to the Corinthians,
chap, xi.: u For I have received of the Lord that
which also I delivered unto you, that the Lord
Jesus, the same night in which He was betrayed,
took bread, and giving thanks, broke and said :
Take ye and eat ; this is My body which shall
be delivered for you : this do for the commemora
tion of Me. In like manner also the chalice
after He had supped, saying : This chalice is
the new testament in My blood : this do ye . . .
for the commemoration of Me. For as often as
you shall eat this bread and drink this chalice, you
shall show the death of the Lord until He come.
Therefore, whosoever shall eat this bread or drink
the chalice of the Lord unworthily shall be
guilty of the Body and Blood of the Lord. But
let a man prove himself, and so let him eat of
50 The Treasure of the Church.
that bread and drink of the chalice. For he that
eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and
drinketh judgment to himself, not discerning the
body of the Lord" (i Cor. xi. 23).
" Not discerning the body of the Lord." Our
first necessity for Holy Communion, then, is to
"discern the body of the Lord."
If we do not understand the quality of the
Divine food which we are receiving, how can we
receive it properly? If we do not recognise the
Lord, Who is coming to visit us, how can we
entertain Him becomingly?
By " discerning," the Apostle evidently means
seeing clearly, and understanding plainly the
presence of our Lord in the Holy Sacrament.
We do this, in the first place, by having a proper
intellectual knowledge of all that the Catholic
Church teaches us about the Blessed Sacrament.
The knowledge which we have of religious
matters ought to be in reasonable proportion to
our knowledge of other things. If you found
anyone well informed on all secular subjects,
but with a scanty and rudimentary knowledge of
the truths of the Catholic faith, you would think
it a scandal. You would think that he was
wanting in a proper appreciation of his religion,
and in a proper respect for it.
Accordingly, " discerning the body of the
Lord," means having a sufficiently accurate
knowledge of the doctrine, in proportion to the
intelligence and education which God has given
you. But this is not quite enough. You must
The Treasure of the Church. 51
discern our Lord's body, not only with the head
but with the heart — and this second way of
discerning it is the most necessary.
You may find, for example, many poor
people, many a labouring man and hard-work
ing woman, who has very little intellectual
knowledge of the Holy Sacrament, and yet
most thoroughly discerns the body of the
Lord. If you were to ask a few questions,
you would, probably, very soon puzzle these
poor people ; but, for all that, they may discern
the Body of the Lord more effectually than
many a theologian. They discern It — not with
their heads, but with their hearts : they delight
in coming before Jesus in the Holy Sacrament —
they are sedulous in hearing Mass, attending
Benedictions and making visits to the Blessed
Sacrament, and in this way they fully discern
the Presence of the Lord, though perhaps they
would not find it very easy to explain their faith
in words.
The first thing, then, is to discern the Body and
the Blood of our Lord in the Blessed Eucharist
— by having good and accurate knowledge of
the true faith concerning It, and then by bringing
that holy faith home to your heart by prayer
and meditation.
And now, perhaps, someone may ask more
precisely what it is that we have to discern. To
this we may answer : we have first to under
stand that here before us in the Blessed
Sacrament we have our Lord in His Divine and
The Treasure oj the Church.
human natures : that Jesus Christ is present
with us, as He was upon earth, but that His
Body is now glorified, and that He is with us in
a new and wonderful state of existence, which
our minds cannot grasp during this mortal life :
—of which we have no experience. We have
to understand that Jesus Christ is hiding Himself
under these forms of bread and wine that He
may be with His people to the end of time, and
communicate the virtue of His Incarnation to
millions of men individually.
Secondly, we have to renew our faith in the
Incarnation and to realize it to our minds. This
Jesus is " God of God, Light of Light, true God
of true God, begotten not made, consubstantial
to the Father, by whom all things were made."
There can be no true faith in the Real Presence
of our Lord in the Holy Sacrament without a
true and fervent belief in the Incarnation.
What is before us in the Holy Eucharist is God
incarnate, that very Lord in whose presence the
angels veil their faces — at whose feet they cast
their crowns. Through a vivid and lively faith
in the Incarnation only, can you really discern
the Body of our Lord in the Holy Sacrament.
Thirdly, you must see clearly not only who
our Lord is, but you must appreciate His
dignity. He is, everywhere, King and God and
Saviour and has a right to be welcomed as such.
When He was an infant in the stable of
Bethlehem, He was King and God — and had a
right to the supreme and adoring worship of all
The Treasure of the Church. 53
angels and men : " And falling down they
adored Him" (St. Matt. ii. n). Again on the
cross, He was King and God — and the world
could not help acknowledging His royalty in
spite of itself — "Jesus of Nazareth, King of
the Jews " (St. John xix. 19).
In the Blessed Sacrament, likewise, He must
be King and God, — and those who do not treat
Him as such, are evidently as far as possible
from really believing in His Presence. The
Church of England declares that " no adoration
is intended, or ought to be done, either unto the
Sacramental Bread or Wine there bodily
received, or unto any Corporal Presence of
Christ's natural Flesh and Blood." By this it
manifestly declares that it does not believe in
any objective presence of our Lord in the
Sacrament.*
Whatever other words may be produced,
apparently teaching the real presence, they are
all shown to be meaningless when tried by this
test. If Christ is not to be honoured and adored
in the Holy Sacrament, He is clearly not
present. If we discern the Body of the Lord,
we must also clearly discern the right which He
has to our supreme and devoted adoration and
reverence, both external and internal.
One more thing must we also duly discern—
and that is the special object of our Lord's
coming to us in this way.
The Catechism says : " Christ has given
*Note at the end of the Communion Service.
54 The Treasure of the Church.
Himself to us in this Sacrament to be the life
and food of our souls." He alone can maintain
the spiritual life within us, and this He does
specially by His Sacramental Presence.
Think of the parable of the wise and foolish
virgins : their lamps were all burning, but the
light could not be maintained without frequently
pouring in fresh oil. This is just what our
Lord does for us in Holy Communion. How
ever brilliant the lamp may be, it is certain that
it will not continue to burn, unless we constantly
renew the supply of oil by prayer and the
frequent use of the Sacraments, and specially by
the Holy Eucharist.
When we speak therefore of discerning the
Body of the Lord, we mean to include four
things :
(ist) What the Blessed Sacrament really is.
(2nd) Who our Lord Jesus Christ is.
(3rd) What is the treatment which He deserves
at our hands.
(4th) What is the special object of the visit
He pays us when we receive Holy Communion.
There is, however, another point in St. Paul's
instruction to which we must attend. He says :
" Let a man prove himself, and so eat of this
bread." Why are we to prove ourselves, and
what are we to find out? Is it to ascertain if we
are free from sin, and worthy to receive our
Lord? Certainly not. None of us are worthy,
and none of us are free from sin. We cannot
be so during this mortal life. What we have
The Treasure of the Church. 55
to find is, whether we are or are not in a state
of grace — that is, free from mortal sin.
We may well, on this occasion, pause to
consider the Church's doctrine on the subject
of mortal and venial sin. Every sin is a wilful
violation of some law of God, and therefore, in
a sense, a rebellion against God. Through the
infirmity of our human nature, however, a great
number of these offences are so incomplete that,
though in themselves acts of rebellion, they are
not really such in us. There is in us so much
half knowledge, and half will : there is so much
inconsequence of judgment : we are so often
taken by surprise and act without due consider
ation, that a great many of our faults fall far
short of being a real rebellion. These we call
venial sins. Even a saint cannot altogether
avoid them in this mortal life, however much
he desires to serve God, and however heartily
he detests any rebellion against his Creator.
To constitute a rebellion against God, an act
must not only be wilful, but completely wilful.
By this we mean that the rebellious act must be
something the importance of which we can
appreciate — since our nature will not allow us
to take note of very small things — and also an
act which we commit with deliberation sufficient
to enable us to comprehend what we are doing.
If a man is tempted to commit some act —
whether internal or external, whether by thought,
word, deed or omission — which act he knows
to be a serious violation of the laws of God ;
56 The Treasure of the Church.
and, having had sufficient opportunity for
deliberation, he commits the act, he has " wor
shipped and served the creature, rather than the
Creator, who is blessed for ever" (Rom. i. 25).
This man has been guilty of a complete
rebellion against his Creator, and cut himself
from the grace and favour of God. Such a
one is no longer in a state of grace, but is in
mortal sin.
A sinful act like this is vastly different from a
venial sin. Venial sins are imperfect, inchoate
acts of rebellion, which the weakness of our
nature will not allow us wholly to avoid, and
which, therefore, do not cut us off from God or
make us rebels against Him : a mortal sin,
however, at once makes a man the enemy of
God.
If, in such a condition, anyone were to dare
to receive Holy Communion, he would be guilty
of a sacrilege. He would, in a way, be repeat
ing the crime of Judas. The crime of Judas
consisted in this, that he used the friendship
and familiarity which our Lord had given him,
that ready access which Jesus allowed him, in
order to deliver over his Master into the hands
of sinners. More than this, he used the sign of
greatest friendship to be the instrument of his
treachery : "Judas, dost thou betray the Son of
Man with a kiss?" (St. Luke xxii. 48). The
sacrilegious communicant does much the same
thing. He uses that most familiar intercourse
which our Lord has deigned to grant us as a
The Treasure of the Church. 57
means of dishonouring Him. He comes up
with every mark of external reverence to receive
our Lord, and so puts Him into the hands of
a rebel and an enemy.
Let us see what St. John Chrysostom says on
this subject: " And therefore it behoveth thee
in all things to be on thy guard, for the punish
ment of him that eateth or drinketh unworthily
is no light one. Bethink thee how thou art
indignant against him who betrayed and them
that crucified the Lord : and look to it well that
thou also be not ( Guilty of the Body and Blood
of the Lord.' As for them, they slew His Most
Holy Body : but thou, after all He hath done
for thee, dost thrust Him into thy polluted soul.
For His love, it was not enough to be made
man, to be buffeted, and to be crucified : He
hath also mingled Himself with us, by making
us His Body, and that not by faith only, but
verily and indeed." ($th lesson, Sund. in Oct.
C C.}. And again: " Hither let there draw
nigh none brutal, none cruel, none merciless,
in good sooth, none unclean. I speak to all
that take that Holy Communion, and to
you also, O ye that do administer the same.
To you now I turn my speech, to warn you with
how great care that Gift is to be given. No
slight vengeance is that which awaiteth you if
ye admit for a partaker at the Lord's table the
sinner whose guiltiness ye knew. At your
hands will His Blood be required. If a man be
a General, a Governor, a crowned Monarch,
58 The Treasure of the Church.
yet, if he come there unworthily, forbid him ;
thou hast greater power than he. . . . And
thou, O layman, when thou seest the priest
making the oblation, think not that He which
is then the real worker is such a priest as thou
seest, but know of a surety that it is Christ's
unseen Hand which is stretched out, albeit
unseen by thee." ($th lesson, Mond. in Oct.
C. C.)
If anyone receives the Holy Communion in
venial sin only, the case is quite different. He
is not then a rebel and an enemy, but a child of
God, though, perhaps, encompassed by many
faults. He still has on his soul the precious
garment of grace, though, perhaps, stained by
minor transgressions, and, if he communicates
lovingly and carefully, the Sacramental grace
bestowed, will, in a great measure, cleanse him
from his stains. It is his duty, out of reverence
and love, to cleanse his soul as well as he can
from past sins before he comes to our Lord's
table, but he cannot expect to be quite free from
sin in this life, and he must not wait till he
thinks he is entirely worthy.
St. Cyril of Alexandria tells us this in these
words : " As for ourselves, if we would win life
everlasting — if we would that the Giver of
immortality should dwell in us — let us run
freely to receive this blessing, and let us beware
that the devil succeed not in laying a stumbling-
block in our way in the shape of a mistaken
reverence. Thou rightly sayest, and we know
The Treasure of the Church. 59
well how it is written : ' Whosoever shall eat
this bread and drink this cup of the Lord
unworthily . . . eateth and drinketh dam
nation to himself.'
" I therefore examine myself, and find myself
unworthy. And I ask thee who citest these
words to me, who shall ever be found worthy?
When wilt thou be such a one as may be worthy
to be offered to Christ? If by sin thou art
unworthy, and thou ceasest not to sin (for, as the
Psalmist hath it, * Who can understand his
errors?' — Ps. xviii. 13), then shalt thou for ever
lack this means of life and sanctification."
(&th lesson, Oct. C. C.)
Venial sins, then, do not prevent us from
receiving Holy Communion, but we are never
theless bound in reverence and love to do all
that we can to free ourselves from every sin
before we approach the Lord's table. " He that
is just, let him be justified still : and he that is
holy, let him be sanctified still" (Ap. xxii. n).
We are told to be u perfect as our Heavenly
Father is perfect " (St. Matt. v. 48) — by which is
meant that we must try to free ourselves from
every stain as far as human weakness will
allow.
Every sin, however slight it may appear in
itself, has the effect of diminishing the supply
of graces given by the sacraments. If I may
use such an illustration, a handful of gravel
amongst the wheels of the most powerful steam
engine would very soon stop its effective work :
60 The Treasure of the Church.
and so sin of any kind in which people wilfully
remain, is quite enough to prevent the effective
working of God's grace in our souls.
When we are to approach Holy Communion,
we should think of the parable in which the
master said to his servant: " Go out quickly
into the streets and lanes of the city, and bring
in hither the poor and the feeble, the blind and
the lame" (St. Luke xiv. 21). We are those
" poor and feeble" who are called to this mar
riage feast. We can fancy how anxiously these
poor people made their poor preparations for
this banquet to which they were invited, and
most of all, how anxious they were to obtain
the wedding garment, which was able to cover
all their deficiencies.
We have been speaking of venial sins as if
they were trifling things ; and, indeed, you do
sometimes hear people talking of " small sins,"
"trivial offences," " things of no consequence,"
and so forth. We must not, however, forget
that every sin is a most serious thing ; so much
so that every Christian ought to be ready to
make any sacrifice rather than commit one venial
sin. Every sin, however small it may appear
to men, is an offence against the great Creator,
and, as far as it goes, is a rebellion against God.
It is, as I said before, only the imperfection of
our human nature which prevents every sin from
being a complete rebellion. It can never, there
fore, be lawful to commit a sin, however small it
may appear. You may not commit any sin
The Treasure of the Church. 61
either to avoid consequences, however serious
those consequences may be ; or to obtain any
good, however desirable. You may not sin,
" for the love or fear of anything upon earth."
But how are we to tell which sins are mortal
and which venial ? This question opens rather
an interesting subject. Someone may say : " I
have looked into theological books, and I find
one thing marked as a mortal and another as a
venial sin ; whereas I cannot see so great a
difference between the acts. You say that the
difference between mortal and venial sin is
immense, and that no number of venial sins
makes one mortal sin. How comes it that the
sinful acts appear so very much alike, and the
boundary between them so little marked?"
The answer to this is that, in fact, every sin
stands by itself, and depends for its guilt upon
the exact state of will with which it is committed.
If a man really has the will to commit a rebellion
against his Creator, then it is a mortal sin.
This state of will is fully known only to
Almighty God, and partially known to the
sinner himself. Other people can only guess
from external circumstances what a man's will
really is. When theological books say that an
act is a mortal sin, it means that it is a mortal
sin supposing it to be done with the dispositions
of mind necessary for mortal sin ; or, in other
words, that, generally speaking, a person com
mitting this act is guilty of a mortal sin. From
this it comes that it is quite possible to perform
62 The Treasure of the Church.
an act in itself quite unimportant or quite lawful,
with such dispositions of mind and will as to be
a mortal sin ; and, on the other hand, an act
may be considered by all theologians as grievous,
and yet from ignorance, inadvertence, and so
forth, the person who does it may not be guilty
of any sin in the sight of God.
In practice, therefore, we ought to do our best
to grieve for all the sins which occur to our
minds, without considering too closely whether
they are mortal or venial, about which we cannot
always be sure, and we ought to include in our
contrition and purpose of amendment whatever
other sins there may be of which we are at the
moment unconscious ; remembering the words
of the Psalmist : "Who can understand sins?
From my secret sins cleanse me, O Lord ! and
from those of others spare thy servant " (Ps.
xviii. 13).
Now, let us ask, Why does the Catechism call
being free from mortal sin a state of grace? It
is perhaps well to explain the two meanings
given to the word grace, or, rather, the two
kinds of grace.
The Latin word gratia, from which grace
comes, means favour, and any kind of favour
given by God may reasonably be called a grace.
So we sometimes hear of health, strength,
beauty, talent and so forth called graces of God.
In religious and catechetical books, however,
the term is used for spiritual favours only. In
this sense we may say that there are two kinds
The Treasure of the Church. 63
of grace which are perfectly distinct. The first
of these is " the help of God." St. Paul says :
" By the grace of God I am what I am, and His
grace in me has not been made void" (i Cor.
xv. 10). In these words, he evidently means
the spiritual assistance of God, which he has
power to use, or to neglect. This kind of grace
is called " actual " grace, because it is required
before we can do any act available to salvation.
Our Lord says : " Without Me you can do
nothing " (St. John xv. 5), and all the good we
do must originate in this helping grace. For this
reason it is often called "preventing" grace.
" Preventing" grace is so called from the Latin
word which means " going before," because
every real good work must be preceded by God's
grace. The word is here used in a sense quite
different from the ordinary meaning of the word
" prevent." This kind of grace is given to the
good and to the bad. Those who accept it
and use it become good : those who reject it,
or in whom, as St. Paul says, "It is made
void," remain wicked and probably become
worse.
This grace is a "passing" grace, which is
supplied to us only as we stand in need of it,
and is a kind of grace containing in itself a
thousand different kinds and species. We may
compare it to a bright ray of the sun, which is
composed of a number of different colours. In
the same way, a thousand different kinds of
light, assistance, and encouragement which we
64 The Treasure of the Church.
at times receive, may all be considered as
" actual grace."
Let us think of this grace as the hand of God
stretched out to help us whilst we are making
our arduous advance up to the Mount of God.
How hard is the way, how difficult the ascent !
It is certain that we could not make one step of
this upward journey without the help of this
loving hand.
The other kind of grace is of an entirely
different nature, and its qualities are strongly
contrasted.
It is "the friendship of God," and it is called
"habitual" or " sanctifying grace." St. Paul
says : " The charity of God is poured forth in
our hearts, by the Holy Ghost who is given to
us " (Rom. v. 5). It is this charity which is
" habitual grace." It is, indeed, the highest of
all God's gifts. When that Royal gift is be
stowed on the sinner, he is at once purified from
his sins and made the child of God. This
" charity of God " and grievous sin cannot exist
together. "What participation hath justice
with injustice? or what fellowship hath light
with darkness, and what concord hath Christ
with Belial?" (2 Cor. vi. 14, 15). When
sanctifying grace enters the soul, mortal sin is
destroyed ; when mortal sin is allowed to enter,
the grace of God leaves us.
This sanctifying grace is called "habitual,"
to signify the way in which it acts in our souls.
It is like a dress (habit2ts^} with which the soul is
The Treasure of the Church. 65
clothed. When the prodigal son returned to
his father, the first thing was to clothe him with
the robe of a son : " Bring quickly the first robe
and put it on him " (St. Luke xv. 22). Again,
let us take the parable of the man found amongst
the guests, " not having on the wedding gar
ment" (St. Matt. xxii. 12). The one condition for
this banquet was to have on this wedding
garment. The Master had invited the poor,
and those from the highways and hedges : they
were not required to have anything of their own,
but this garment — which his bounty, no doubt,
had supplied for those who chose to use it — was
essential.
This exactly represents the garment of Divine
grace. Nothing of our own is acceptable, but
we must be clothed with that glorious garment
purchased by the Precious Blood of our Lord —
the garment of habitual grace, the " charity ol
God poured into our hearts by the Holy Spirit "
(Rom. v. 5).
God's Divine grace clothes us with a garment,
but it is not like an earthly garment which
covers but does not cleanse. Habitual grace
sanctifies as well as adorns. The moment any
sinner has received this grace, the guilt of all
the mortal sins he may have committed is at
once forgiven, and he is really once more the
child of God. It is not that he is dressed so as
to resemble God's children, but he is actually
admitted into that glorious company.
" Let a man prove himself." We have now
6
66 The Treasure of the Church.
to consider more exactly in what way we are to
prove ourselves. In order to do this sufficiently,
we must use the Sacrament of Penance, which
our Lord has instituted to forgive our sins, and
to enable us to amend our lives.
The Holy Eucharist requires the greatest
purity of conscience to which we can attain, and
it seems almost necessary that He should give
us, with it, another Sacrament to enable us to
make the necessary purification. Go to that
table of the last Supper and see how our Lord
prepares His Apostles for that First Communion
they were to receive at His hands. He laid
aside His garments, and having taken a towel
began to wash the feet of His disciples, "and
Peter said to Him : Thou shalt never wash my
feet. Jesus answered him : If I wash thee not
thou shalt have no part with me " (St. John
xiii. 4).
Can anything more strongly express the
absolute need of some special means of puri
fication — some means appointed by Christ
Himself — before men could be admitted to such
union with their Creator ? The Sacrament of
Penance is, then, in almost all cases, the
necessary preparation for Holy Communion.
If a man is conscious of mortal sin it is abso
lutely necessary under pain of sacrilege that he
should make a good confession. It may be said
that sins can be forgiven, without the Sacrament
of Penance : that is true, but the Church is not
contented to trust to this — considering what very
The Treasure of the Church. 67
bad judges we generally are of our own dis
positions. The Council of Trent laid it down
most positively that no one, conscious of having
committed a grievous sin, should venture to
receive Holy Communion without previous con
fession — "however contrite he might appear to
himself to be for his sins " (Sess. xiii. cap. 7).
But suppose him not to be conscious of any
mortal sin, is he still bound to go to confession
before receiving Communion ?
To this we may answer that, as a general
rule, he certainly is bound ; not by the same
imperative law, but by the feeling of reverence
he ought to have for our Lord in the Holy
Sacrament.
Who could consider himself so perfect as to
require no special purification before receiving
our Lord? And who will dare to substitute
some device of his own to obtain that puri
fication, instead of making use of the means
our Lord himself has appointed ?
Consider what care men take when they are
going into the presence of an earthly sovereign.
When a king goes to visit his people, immense
preparations are made ; and what is any earthly
sovereignty in comparison to the visit which
our Lord pays us in the Blessed Sacrament !
We may safely say, then, that anyone receiving
Holy Communion without first going to con
fession would be guilty of a gross irreverence.
To this, however, we make two exceptions :
first, in the case of those who have no oppor-
68 The Treasure of the Church.
tunity of making their confession ; secondly,
for those who have received the Sacrament of
Penance a short time previously. For instance,
if anyone desired to receive Holy Communion
two or three times a week, it would generally be
sufficient to go to confession once, supposing,
that is, that he was not conscious of any grievous
sin.
A good deal has been said about " compulsory
Confession" in the Catholic Church — and I
rather think some learned Protestant Divine
lately discovered that in the Church there were
two conflicting ideas, or two schools of doctrine
on this subject. Nothing can be farther from
the truth.
In one sense, certainly, confession is not com
pulsory. A man might, if he chose, go very
often to Holy Communion and never go to
confession at all. A hundred people might
receive Holy Communion in my church, and I
might, or might not, know that twenty of them
had been to confession. As to the others I
know nothing, and have no means of knowing.
No priest would ever dream of asking them,
and under ordinary circumstances would have
no right to do so.
In another sense, however, there is the strict
est compulsion : that is, everybody thoroughly
understands the absolute obligation of confession
for all who are in mortal sin, and the sort of
obligation which I have described in other
cases.
The Treasure of the Church. 69
In practice certainly, speaking broadly, no
Catholic ever dreams of receiving Holy Com
munion without confession. Many, unfortu
nately are negligent in receiving the sacraments,
and people sometimes make their confessions
with more or less imperfect dispositions ; but no
one, saint or sinner, believes that he is at liberty
to dispense with confession before Holy Com
munion, except in the circumstances which I
have already explained.
Protestants sometimes talk about ecclesiastical
domination, and seem to think that the laity are
domineered over by the clergy, but in fact there
is a simple and intelligible law to which clergy
and laity alike submit, because they acknow
ledge its authority and see its reasonableness,
and there is abundant room for individual
freedom of action. The law of confession before
Holy Communion, for instance, applies just as
strictly to the clergy as to the laity. Priests,
bishops, and the Pope himself, receive the
Sacrament of Penance before Holy Communion
just as regularly as lay people do.
I have now explained what St. Paul means
by " let a man prove himself," and in the next
chapter, I will consider the other conditions for
a Good Communion.
CHAPTER IV.
OUR GUEST. — HOLY COMMUNION (continued).
External Reverence.— The Guardian of the Treasure. — The
Lawgiver of the Ceremonial. — Fasting, the Law of the
Church. — Ritualists and Fasting Communion. — Moment
at which to receive. — Why the Bell is rung. — Where and
with what precautions to receive. — Dispositions at
moment of reception. — Thanksgiving. — Zacheus, our
example. — Direct personal prayer of Union. — Protestant
fallacy. — Oblation. — Petition. — Language of Public Wor
ship. — Must and Ought. — Carelessness, Scruples and
False Humility.
I MUST now speak of the other conditions laid
down in the Catechism. We must be " in a
state of grace and fasting from midnight."
This last is a very strict law, and dispensations
are very seldom given. In danger of death the
law does not hold, so that the sick man is not
bound to fast even if he is able to do so.
It is to be understood that there are two kinds
of fasting : the ecclesiastical fast and the natural
fast. The ecclesiastical fast means abstaining
from some sorts of food at certain hours, as
we fast and abstain during Lent. In this fast
there is no restriction as to drink, and trifling
The Treasure of the Church. 71
things do not break the fast. The natural fast
however means a complete abstinence from
everything in the way of food, drink, or medicine
— and it is broken by any quantity, however
small, taken as food.
This is a very strict rule in the Catholic
Church, and the Ritualist party seem to consider
it as a matter of great importance. Now let us
ask : Why so? Are you any worse in the sight
of God after you have had your breakfast? If
not, why should you make it a reason for
abstaining from Holy Communion? Certainly
the Apostles were not fasting when our Lord
gave them their First Communion : why then
should we fast ?
This opens to us an interesting point of con
sideration. When our Lord established the
Holy Eucharist, and left it as a permanent gift
to men, it is pretty obvious that He must have
entrusted the care of it to someone. It is not
conceivable that He meant each individual in
the crowd to treat so great a Sacrament accord
ing to his own whim and fancy. The Holy
Eucharist, then, was intrusted not to one man or
another, but to the guardianship of the Catholic
Church. Nothing but a society, composed of
mortal men, indeed, but, in its corporate
existence, undying, could possibly take charge
of a Sacrament meant to last " all days to the
end of the world." The care of the Holy
Eucharist, then, is left not to you, or to me, but
to the Catholic Church ; and it is the duty of the
72 The Treasure of the Church.
Catholic Church to lay down such rules, and
make such provisions as may seem necessary to
guard the Holy Sacrament from irreverence, and
to preserve the feeling of devotion amongst
men. The rites and ceremonial which the
Church ordains, are, in themselves and of
themselves absolutely unimportant, but the
moment they are ordained, it becomes a most
important duty of reverence and obedience to
observe them.
This is just what happens amongst men. A
great review is to be held in presence of a
sovereign. The general directs most minutely
the uniform the men are to wear, the positions
they are to assume, and the evolutions they are
to practise. He might, perhaps, have arranged
this in three or four ways, which would have
answered the purpose quite as well ; but the
moment his orders are given, there is no further
discretion — everyone is bound to obey under
very severe penalties.
So it is with the Church's regulations. In
the nature of things, it was inevitable that some
external marks of reverence should be shown
towards the Blessed Sacrament by those who
believed in the Real Presence ;— but all the
external forms might have been quite different.
It is the fact that these ceremonials have been
ordered by the Catholic Church which gives
them their importance, and nothing else.
We say, then, that we receive Holy Communion
fasting, simply and solely because the Church
The Treasure of the Church. 73
so directs : — and this same answer applies to all
the ceremonial which the Church uses. We
are delighted to hear of the efforts made by
Ritualistic clergy to introduce fasting Com
munion, because it seems to indicate a growing
devotion to the Real Presence, but we cannot but
say that their position seems to us to be utterly
illogical. The Church of England certainly
does not oblige people to receive Holy Com
munion fasting ; if there ever was such a custom,
it has been obsolete for some centuries. If,
therefore, fasting is made a matter of obligation,
it is not because it is enjoined by Ecclesiastical
Authority, but because the thing appears to
them important in itself — which, to us, seems
absurd. These worthy men can hardly found
their practice on the authority of the Roman
Church, considering that in so many much
more important things they completely dis
regard the authority of that same Church.
It is the duty of everyone carefully to carry
out whatever the Church has ordained, out
of reverence to the Blessed Sacrament. Nothing
can be trivial which is commanded for such an
end. At the same time we ought not to go
beyond the Church's directions. It might be
supposed that no external reverence and care
for the Blessed Sacrament could be too great,
but that is not so. An unreasonable and
excessive external devotion might very easily
interfere with the objects for which our Lord
instituted the Sacrament. The Jansenists re-
74 The Treasure of the Church.
quired an exaggerated degree of preparation for
receiving Holy Communion — so that men were
to a great extent kept away from the Holy
Sacrament. The Church lays down very care
fully what precautions should be taken to avoid
accidents to the Sacred Species : if you were to
go beyond those it would soon cease to be rever
ence and degenerate into distrust — as if you
thought our Lord needed your precautions.
Moreover, your extra precaution probably would
cause endless and dangerous scruples. Again
the Church is most anxious that all should
approach this Sacrament in excellent dis
positions, but if you ask for more than the
Church requires, you will certainly keep men
away from the Sacraments. As an example of
this, a story is told of a worthy Jansenist who
thanked God that no one had made a bad Com
munion for many months, because no one had
communicated at all during that time.
" The Sacraments were made for man and not
man for the Sacraments," and therefore the
Church's work is not to allow anything that will
prevent them from being used as freely as Our
Lord intended them to be used.
I will now speak of the way in which we are
to receive Holy Communion. The natural time
for the laity to receive it is at the Mass, immedi
ately after the priest's Communion. The priest
himself when he celebrates always receives the
Blessed Sacrament for the completion of the
Holy Sacrifice. The Consecration and Com-
The Treasure of the Church. 75
munion are the parts of the Mass essentially
necessary for the completion of the Sacrifice.
After receiving, the priest gives Holy Com
munion to all the faithful who come up to the
altar. It must be remembered, however, that
this usage cannot always be carried out. When
there is a crowd of communicants the Mass
would be unreasonably prolonged if they all
received in the course of it. For example : in
some of the large churches abroad, on great
occasions, thousands of people come to Holy
Communion. If they were to receive during
Mass, the celebration might be prolonged for
hours. In large churches, therefore, Communion
is very often given, not at Mass, but before or
after it, or indeed at any other suitable time.
Those who intend to communicate at the Mass
come up to the altar when the bell rings for the
" Domine, non sum dignus." It may be well
here to say a word about the ringing of the bell,
the changes of position, and the things notice
able about the Mass.
The bell is rung at different times to let the
congregation know the part of the Mass in
which the priest is engaged. In a large church
a great many of those present cannot hear what
the priest is saying. It is not in the least neces
sary that they should do so. They come to
Mass to join in the great action which the priest
is doing, not to listen to the prayers he is
saying.
"And all the multitude of the people was
76 TJie Treasure of the Church.
praying without at the hour of incense .
and they wondered that he tarried so long in
the temple " (St. Luke i. 10). The people out
side were joining with Zachary in the offering of
incense, and they could do so quite well, though
they could not see him nor hear him. So it is at
the Mass ; a vast multitude may join in offering
the sacrifice, though but a few are able to dis
tinguish the words said. The bell ringing at
intervals tells them precisely what the priest is
doing. The same object is obtained by the
different positions of the book on the altar.
Anyone coming in whilst Mass is going on can
tell in a moment the part of the Mass to which
the priest has arrived.
The bell rings four times during the Mass.
The first occasion is the " Sanctus " — the end,
that is, of the Preface. This marks the begin
ning of the " Canon," or more solemn part of
the Mass. The earlier part, which is the pre
paration for the sacrifice, used to be called in
early ages the " Mass of Catechumens," because
those who had not yet been baptised were not
allowed to be present at the more solemn part of
the sacrifice. The Canon contains the Consecra
tion and Communion, and is the essential part
of the Mass. The bell is meant to call the
attention of those present, who are perhaps
engaged in other devotions, that they may be
ready for the Consecration which is near at
hand.
The next bell, sometimes called the "warning
The Treasure of the Church. 77
bell," is immediately before the Consecration,
and people then usually lay aside their books
and bow their heads in readiness for the Con
secration. At the Consecration itself, the bell
rings three times for the Consecration of the
Host, and three times for the Consecration of
the Chalice. These bells call on us first to adore
our Lord, present under the form of bread, and
then to adore Him present, for the completion
of the sacrifice, under the form of wine in the
chalice.
The fourth time the bell rings is at the
" Domine, non sum dignus." This announces
that the priest is about to receive the Holy
Sacrament, and that all who would communicate
must approach the altar, whilst at the same time
it admonishes all others to join by a spiritual
communion in what the priest is doing.
I ought, however, to notice that the times of
ringing the bells at Mass are different in different
places ; indeed, it is said that our custom of
ringing the bell at the " Domine, non sum
dignus " is not correct, or, at any rate, not usual
in other countries. It is, however, a very con
venient custom, as it tells communicants exactly
when they should leave their places.
Those about to communicate kneel at the altar
rails, and hold before them the communion
cloth. The object of this is to prevent the
Blessed Sacrament from falling accidentally to
the ground. These precautions are taken, as I
before said, out of reverence. It would be
78 The Treasure of the Church.
grievous and irreverent in the eyes of all Chris
tians should such an accident happen, although
we understand perfectly that no mischance can,
in the slightest degree, affect the glorious body
of our Lord. In some churches, instead of this
cloth, it is usual to hand from one to the other a
small card covered with a corporal for the same
purpose. The attendant, or "server," recites
the " Confiteor " in the name of the communi
cants. You are supposed to have done your
best in the way of preparation, and yet, when
you are going to receive our Lord, you cannot
but acknowledge yourself a sinner, and an un
profitable servant, and wish, if possible, once
more to purify your soul. The priest makes the
same act of humiliation at the beginning of
Mass. He is to stand at the altar, in a sense, as
representing our Lord and sharing in His priest
hood ; but, before venturing to go up to the
altar, he confesses himself a sinner by thought,
word and deed, and asks for forgiveness.
After the words of humiliation and forgiveness
the priest holds up the Blessed Sacrament, with
the words, 4< Behold the Lamb of God, behold
Him Who taketh away the sins of the world "
(St. John i. 29). We can fancy to ourselves the
rapture and reverence with which St. John the
Baptist pronounced these words, and the pro
found humility with which he declared himself
unworthy to loose even the latchet of His shoe.
Then follow again the words "Domine, non sum
dignus"-— " Lord, I am not worthy that Thou
The Treasure of the Church. 79
shouldst enter under my roof, but only say
the word and my soul shall be healed " (cf.
St. Matt. viii. 8). How beautifully has the Church
adapted these words from those of the centurion
in the Gospel, and how beautifully do they
express our feelings when we are going to
receive Holy Communion !
The priest then carries down the Blessed
Sacrament, and places it on the tongue of each
communicant, with the words, "The Body of
our Lord Jesus Christ preserve thy soul to ever
lasting life." Eternal life, that is the one great
end. "He that eateth My flesh and drinketh
My blood hath everlasting life, and I will raise
him up at the last day " (St. John vi. 55).
But, it may be asked why the faithful are not
allowed to communicate themselves with their
own hands ? To this we must give exactly the
same reply as before. The Catholic Church has
the charge of the Blessed Sacrament, and, as a
precaution against irreverence, has decreed that
no one shall presume to touch the Holy Eucharist
except its appointed minister. When a priest is
ordained, his hands are consecrated with the
holy oil because it is his duty and his privilege
to take in his hand the Body of our Lord.
When once this law has been made by the
Church out of reverence, it would be a great sin
to violate it, although in the nature of things
there is no reason why the laity should not touch
the sacred species as well as the clergy.
Now let us consider how the communicant
80 The Treasure of the Church.
should act. He should, of course, join heartily
in the Confession and absolution, and bow down
very humbly before that Lamb of God who is
presented to him. When it comes to his turn to
receive, however, he must kneel quite erect and
be quite still, that the priest may give him the
Holy Sacrament without mischance.
This is all easy, but with what inward feelings
is he to receive his Lord? " Falling down they
adored Him, and opening their treasures they
offered Him gifts" (St. Matt. ii. n). How little
is all that we can offer Him. Think how the
angels cast their crowns before Him, and cry
out without ceasing: " Holy, holy, holy Lord
God of Hosts " (Isai. vi. 3). Yet it has pleased
Him to ask for our homage and our praise :
11 Out of the mouths of infants and sucklings
thou hast perfected praise " (Ps. viii. 3) : and,
in a sense, we can offer what they cannot.
They see Him face to face and cannot help
adoring and praising Him, but we can offer a
more acceptable homage because we do not see,
because our adoration is free ; we can give it or
withhold it. "Because thou hast seen me,
Thomas, thou hast believed, blessed are those
who have not seen yet have believed "
(St. John xx. 29).
The thanksgiving after Communion is, in one
sense, the most important part of our work. It
is the gathering in of the harvest. We have
tried hard to prepare ourselves, but if we do not
take corresponding pains to avail ourselves of
The Treasure of the Church. 81
the great gift when it comes, our labours will
be of little use. When the husbandman has
toiled sowing the seed and tending his crops, he
does not neglect the harvest time. " They that
sow in tears shall reap in joy. Going they went
and wept, casting their seeds. But coming they
shall come with joyfulness, carrying their
sheaves." (Ps. cxxv. 5). St. John Chrysostom
says : " When we come back from that table we
ought to be like so many lions, breathing fire,
dreadful to the devil. Our thoughts ought to be
consecrated to our Great Head, and on the love
which He showeth us " ($th lesson, Saturday,
Oct. of Corpus Christi).
It is a great scandal to see people very shortly
after Communion, directly the Mass is finished,
going away to their ordinary occupations with
very little thought of the great Guest whom
they have received. We ought to think of what
our Lord said to Simon the Pharisee: " Dost
thou see this woman ? I entered into thy house
and thou gavest me no water for my feet : but she
with tears hath washed my feet and with her hair
hath wiped them. Thou gavest me no kiss ;
but, she, since she came in, hath not ceased to
kiss my feet. My head with oil thou didst
not anoint, but she with ointment hath anointed
my feet. Wherefore I say to thee, many sins
are forgiven her because she hath loved much "
(St. Luke vii. 44).
Our Lord comes to us with abundant treasures
of grace, which He is willing to bestow on us in
7
82 The Treasure of the Church.
proportion to our capacity ; ought we not to say,
as Jacob said to the angel : " I will not let thee
go, except thou bless me " (Gen. xxxii. 26).
I will conclude what I have to say on pre
paration for Holy Communion by dwelling on
our Lord's visit to Zacheus, which seems to me
to present an excellent model to all who are
about to receive the Holy Sacrament.
Zacheus was burning with a desire to see our
Lord, and so climbed up into a tree. " Jesus said
to him : Make haste and come down, for this day
I must abide in thy house. And he made
haste and came down and received Him with
joy, and when all saw it they murmured, saying
that He was gone to be a guest with a man that
was a sinner. But Zacheus standing said to the
Lord : Behold, Lord, the half of my goods I
give to the poor, and if I have wronged any man
of anything I restore him four-fold. Jesus said
to him : This day is salvation come to this
house " (St. Luke xix. 5).
This seems to present a wonderful analogy to
the Holy Communion. In this Sacrament our
Lord calls us by name and says : " This day
must I abide in thy house." Zacheus hastened
home and prepared a feast for our Lord. We
are quite sure he made his house as clean as
possible, and removed everything that might be
offensive. He was a rich man, and no doubt he
brought out all his treasures, his gold, his
tapestry, and everything he had that was
beautiful, in our Lord's honour. This is just
The Treasure of the Church. 83
what we have to do. We must be diligent in
purifying and adorning the inward house of our
souls. What treasures have we to produce?
Little enough, but we can make acts of many
virtues. We can express our faith and put it
into burning words : we can renew our hope and
excite and warm up our love. We can humble
ourselves and think how little we are before
Him ; — we can offer Jiim our wills, and desire
to resign them to His divine will. All these
things are the treasure with which we must
adorn our souls.
Again, what did Zacheus do when our Lord
actually came to him ? We are quite sure that
he ministered to Him, that he hung on his
words, and never for one moment forgot Him.
If he had turned his back on his Guest, and
employed himself about his ordinary affairs, all
the preparations he had made would have been
of little avail. Without personal service, all his
pretty things would have been worthless. The
same applies to us. If we do not adore and
praise and bless our Lord when He visits us,
He will not be pleased with us, whatever else
we may have done. It is emphatically the time
for " Communion " — for speaking to our Lord
and listening to His voice.
The prayers, we say, ought, on such occa
sions, to be our own, as far as possible. The
prayers we find in books are very beautiful, but
they must not supersede our own words. We
must use them as guides, not as substitutes .
84 The Treasure of the Church.
that is, we must endeavour to put into our own
language the burning thoughts which they
suggest. We may be quite sure that words of
our own from our own hearts will go further
with our Lord than any book words however
beautiful.
The very idea of devotion after Communion
is that of union, that we should be alone with
our Lord — solus cum solo — and united with
Him. St. John Chrysostom says: " That this
union may take place not by love alone, but
verily and indeed, we ought to mingle our own
with His flesh ... to this end He hath
mingled Himself with us, and infused His Body
into our bodies that we may be one together,
like as the limbs of a man and his head are all
of one body " (^.th lesson, Saturday, Oct. of
Corpus Christi).
This close and direct union is the object of
all the prayers suggested to us as thanksgiving
after Communion. Some Protestants have a
foolish notion that we think it almost pre
sumption to speak directly to our Lord, and
that we consider it better to address Him in
directly, through the intercession of some saint
or other. If they would ever take the trouble
to look for themselves, and read the prayers
before and after Communion in any language,
that idea would instantly be dispelled. It is
impossible for any prayers to be more direct
and personal. The same remark applies to all
the prayers most commonly used amongst
The Treasure of the Church. 85
Catholics : Morning and Night prayers ; prayers
at Mass ; prayers for Confession : are all most
directly addressed to Almighty God, and the
Saints are scarcely alluded to in them This
applies not only to the devotions contained in
our English prayer books, but to those in the
corresponding books in French, Italian, German,
Spanish and all other languages.
At the time of Holy Communion, our Lord
seems to speak to us in the words of the psalm :
" Hearken, O daughter, and see and incline
thy ear : and forget thy people and thy father's
house" (Ps. xliv. n). Shall we, by our
actions, say that we have no time to attend to
Him ; that we have something more important
to do than to converse with Him !
There is one point remaining. Zacheus was
not contented with receiving our Lord well ; he
also made promises of amendment. " Half of
my goods will I give to the poor." He was not
satisfied without making some offering to our
Lord suitable to the occasion. What can we
offer? I think that each one knows of something
which he could offer to our Lord. There is
something which he very well knows our Lord
would like him to do. There is some point of
conduct which our Lord would like to see
corrected. Let us then at Holy Communion
make a generous offering, and not be contented
with words, but be ready to do something in our
future lives which we think will be pleasing
to God. Then shall we surely hear the words
86 The Treasure of the Church.
which Jesus addressed to Zacheus : " This day
is salvation come to this house."
In the prayer books you will find prayers
after Communion, which are substantially the
same in all books. First come Aspirations after
Communion, that is, short fervent addresses to
our Lord : " I have Thee now, Who hast all
things ; I possess thee who possesses! all things."
" Let my heart be fixed on Thee alone ; let me
ever repose in Thee, where alone my treasure
is." " Let my soul, O Lord, feel the sweetness
of Thy presence." "Heal my soul, for I have
sinned against Thee." " May the sweet flame of
Thy love consume my soul. " After a great many
such aspirations come " Acts of devotion, praise,
and thanksgiving." We find acts of adoration
and self-humiliation. " But first bow down
thyself with all thy powers to adore the sovereign
Majesty which has vouchsafed to come to visit
thee." "Annihilate thyself in the presence of
this eternal, immense, infinite Deity." "Thou
art great, O Lord, and exceedingly to be praised :
great are Thy works, and of Thy wisdom there
is no end."
After such acts as these comes "An oblation
after Communion." Our Lord gives Himself to
us ; and has become our sacrifice, and we, in
turn, offer to the Eternal Father the Precious
Blood which He has given to us ; and, with
Him, we make the best offering we can of
ourselves.
" Receive, O Holy Father, Almighty and
The Treasure of the Church. 87
Everlasting God, this Holy and Unspotted
Victim, which I here offer Thee, in union with
that love with which He offered Himself to Thee
on the altar of the cross."
St. Paul says of our Lord : " He continueth
for ever, hath an everlasting priesthood, whereby
He is able also to save for ever them that come to
God by Him : always living to make intercession
for us " (Heb. vii. 24). When our Lord visits
us in the Blessed Sacrament, it is not only to be
our food, but to be the most acceptable offering
which we can present to the Eternal Father.
After this " oblation" we naturally find a
number of petitions. We may think we have
our Lord speaking to us, as He did to the blind
man by the wayside, and saying: " What wilt
thou that I do to thee?" (St. Luke xviii. 41).
Have we nothing to say in answer? Surely we
must put before Him all our wants, spiritual
and temporal. We need not be afraid to ask,—
since his hands are full of good things. We
must pray for ourselves, for all the virtues we
want, and all the vices we have to conquer. We
must pray for the Church of God, and for all
the needs of our Holy Father the Pope. In
St. Peter's time, " prayer was made without
ceasing by the Church unto God for Him"
(Acts xii. 5) — and so it ought to be made with
out ceasing for his successor. We have also to
pray for many others, in such words as these :
" Have mercy also on my parents, friends and
benefactors, and for all those for whom I am in
88 The Treasure of the Church.
any way bound to pray, that we may all love
Thee and faithfully serve Thee."
We may add to these prayers many of the
beautiful prayers of the Church — the Benedicite,
the Te Deum, the Adoro Te Devote, the Anima
C/iristi — all of which are to be found, gener
ally in Latin and English, in most prayer
books.
I have dwelt on these prayers at some length,
although they are to be found everywhere,
because they show the tone of the Catholic
Church in speaking to Our Lord, and there is
nothing which brings out the doctrine of the
Catholic Church more clearly than the language
of her devotions. As Pius IX. says in his
decree about the Immaculate Conception : " The
language used in public worship is the necessary
offspring of the teaching which it expresseth,
and the former can have no safety unless the
latter be settled " (^.th lesson, $th day in Oct.
Immac. Cone.)
From these different devotions we can easily
select materials for the quarter of an hour's
thanksgiving which we ought always to make
after Communion.
I must now pause to consider how often and
at what times Christians are bound to receive
the Holy Sacrament. It is a matter of absolute
obligation to receive it, as the catechism tells us,
" once a year, and that at Easter." This
requires explanation. The time of fulfilling the
" Paschal Precept" varies in different places.
The Treasure, of the Church. 89
When the facilities for receiving Holy Com
munion are great, the time is shorter ; when
the clergy are few, and the churches at greater
distance, the time is extended. With us it is
from Ash Wednesday to Low Sunday — from
the beginning of Lent till the Sunday after
Easter. In the course of these fifty-four days,
everyone is bound to communicate under pain
of mortal sin, unless there is some sufficient
ground of excuse. This was most strictly com
manded by the Church in the 4th Council of
Lateran.
Our Lord Himself commanded us to receive
the Blessed Sacrament, but He left it to His
Church to say at what times this duty was to
be performed, so that the Church's law is but
carrying out in detail what Christ ordained.
If anyone neglects to receive Holy Communion
at the proper time, he commits a great sin, but
he is still bound by the law. If you were to
neglect to hear Mass on Sunday, you would not
be obliged to hear Mass the next day ; but with
the precept of Easter Communion it is different.
You are bound to receive as soon as possible
afterwards.
We are also bound to receive the Blessed
Sacrament when we are in danger of death—
as Viaticum — if we are able to do so, in
order to make a fitting preparation for our
last end.
But now let us consider how often people
ought id receive Holy Communion. The Church
90 The Treasure of the Church.
obliges us to receive at Easter, not as if that
were enough, but that we may not be able to
excuse ourselves by saying that no particular
time is appointed.
The Blessed Sacrament is to be our food,
and the very idea of food implies that it must
be taken frequently and at regular intervals, if
it is to do us much good. Each one, therefore,
ought to consider how often his own spiritual
condition, and the circumstances in which he is
placed, make it expedient for him to approach
our Lord's Holy Table. What would be often
enough for some people, certainly would not be
sufficient for others. You may, however, say
that for most people it is desirable to come to
the Sacraments once a month. Many people
ought to go much more frequently ; for example,
to go to Communion on Sundays and holidays.
Even that, however, is hardly called frequent
Communion, and there are many whose spiritual
condition makes it desirable to receive several
times in the week, or even every day. In this
matter everyone ought to be guided by the
advice of his confessor.
Now what are the reasons that keep people
away? With many it is simple carelessness.
They are not in earnest in their religion, and do
not want to love and serve God any better.
They grudge the time and trouble which the
sacraments involve, and want to do as little for
Almighty God as they possibly can. Such
people are in a very sad state, and it is only the
The Treasure of the Church. 91
special mercy of God if they do not fall away
altogether.
Many, however, are kept away by scruples.
They are not content with observing the rules
and taking the precautions the Church has
ordered, but they have a number of little regula
tions and scruples of their own. They are
troubled about the fasting required, and are
always fancying that they have broken their
fast in half-a-dozen impossible ways. Again,
they are unreasonably afraid of accidents and
irreverences which they think may happen to the
Holy Sacrament, forgetting that their business
is to do what the Church tells them and no more.
Such scrupulousness, as I have before said, is
very apt to degenerate into want of confidence
and distrust.
Some, again, keep away because they do not
think themselves sufficiently devout. They do
not feel nearly so much devotion at the time of
Communion as they would like to feel, and,
therefore, are afraid to approach. These people
should remember that they are not to receive
Holy Communion because they are saints, but
because they want to become a little better in
the sight of God, and to do their duty devoutly
to Him. They should also remember that
sensible devotion — that is, a feeling of fervour —
is by no means necessary for a good Communion :
you may please God, and receive much grace
although you feel very little of this fervour.
Such feelings are a good deal a matter of natural
92 The Treasure of the Church.
temperament, and our Lord has never promised
to work visible miracles in the Holy Sacrament.
To do so would be contrary to the very idea of
this sacrament, which was to be a standing
miracle, indeed, but not one manifest to our
senses. Even the saints, with all their diligence
in preparing for Holy Communion, were con
stantly tried by seasons of dryness and coldness.
This comes sometimes from natural causes,
health and external circumstances, and some
times as a direct trial sent by God. If you
persevere, in spite of this dryness and coldness,
and want of the feeling of devotion, your Com
munion will, very likely, be much more accept
able to God than if you abounded in tenderness
and spiritual consolation. By receiving Holy
Communion diligently in such a case, it is clear
that you are doing so to please God, and not to
please yourself; and no doubt, in due season,
the cloud will pass away, and spiritual consola
tion will return to you.
Do not, then, allow either carelessness or false
humility, or scruples of your own invention, or
fear of coldness and indevotion, to keep you
from receiving the Holy Sacrament as often as
you ought to do so, considering the circum
stances, and the state of life in which you are
placed.
I may well conclude what I have been saying
by a quotation from St. Cyril of Alexandria about
the Blessed Sacrament :
" I counsel thee to betake thee to godly
The Treasure of the Church. 93
thoughts, and to live carefully and holily, and
so to receive that blessing — a blessing which,
believe me, doth banish not death only, but all
diseases likewise. For when Christ dwelleth in
us, He stilleth the law of death in our members,
which warreth against the law of our mind. He
giveth strength to godliness, He turneth to calm
the turbulent surging of our mind ; He cureth
them that are sick ; He raiseth up them that are
fallen, and, like the good shepherd who giveth
his life for the sheep, He prevaileth that the
sheep perish not " (yth lesson, Oct. day of
C.C.)
So says St. Cyril in the fifth century, so says
the Catholic Church in the twentieth century.
CHAPTER V.
THE GIFT AND HOLY SCRIPTURE — FAITH.
A doctrine independent of Scripture texts. — Old Testament
types. — Names derived from Scriptural sources. — New
Testament proofs. — The promise. — The fulfilment. — Sub
sequent references. — Test of our faith in the authority of
the Church. — Lutheran idea of Faith.— St. Paul's teach
ing. — A foundation. — A gift. — The worship of the intellect.
A virtue. — To be guarded. — Hope, the worship of the
desires. — Charity, the worship of the affections.
I HAVE endeavoured to describe the dispositions
necessary for receiving the Holy Eucharist
worthily, and the sort of preparation to be made
before approaching that Holy Sacrament. I
want now to treat of another part of the subject,
that is, to consider all that the Holy Scripture
tells us about the Blessed Eucharist.
In the first place, then, it is obvious that the
doctrine of the Catholic Church does not depend
on any passages of Scripture.
The Christian faith was taught to men, and the
doctrine of the Real Presence was taught as
part of it, before any portion of the New
Testament was written. It is absurd to suppose
The Treasure of the Church. 95
that the Apostles taught mankind a blank
religion, the details of which were to be filled up
when the Evangelists and other Scripture writers
could find time to write down what Almighty
God had given them to say.
The Gospels and Epistles were written to
give to the faithful fuller information about our
Lord's life and words, to explain points of
doctrine as occasion arose, and to insist on
certain duties ; — not to teach a system of
religious faith, inasmuch as the Christian Faith
had been taught before the Scriptures were
written. In other words, St. Paul tells us : " All
Scripture, inspired of God, is profitable to teach,
to reprove, to correct, to instruct in justice, that
the man of God may be perfect, furnished to
every good work " (2 Tim. iii. 16, 17).
The doctrine of the Holy Eucharist, then, like
all other doctrines of the Catholic Church, is
independent of any texts of Scripture : never
theless we must avail ourselves diligently of all
that the Holy Scripture tells us about this great
Sacrament. Whither shall we turn for light and
for devotion : whither for good thoughts and
fervent aspirations, if not to these divinely in
spired words ? When we read them, may we not
say, as the disciples at Emmaus, said : " Was not
our heart burning within us, whilst He spoke in
the way and opened to us the Scriptures ? " (St.
Luke xxiv. 32).
Let us turn, then, to the Old Testament, and
consider those things which are taken as types
96 The Treasure of the Church.
and figures, or, in a way, forerunners of the
Holy Eucharist. The first of these is the " tree of
life " (Gen. iii. 22). He who should eat of the
fruit of this tree should "live for ever." And our
Lord says: "He that eateth this bread shall live
for ever " (St. John vi. 69). " He that eateth
my flesh and drinketh my blood hath everlasting
life and I will raise him up in the last day " (St.
John vi. 55).
Is there not a wonderful correspondence
between this mysterious tree of life, of which we
are told so little, and that great Sacrament which
occupies so grand a place in the history of man's
salvation !
Melchisedech and his sacrifice (Gen. xiv. 18)
are another type. Our Lord was to be " a priest
for ever according to the order of Melchisedech "
(Ps. civ. 4. — Heb. vii. 17). He possesed a new
priesthood, and the sacrifice which He instituted
was most exactly foreshadowed by that sacrifice
of bread and wine which Melchisedech offered.
Without this fulfilment, how very unintelligible
would this ancient sacrifice be to us !
Our Lord Himself compares this Holy
Eucharist to the manna : " Your fathers did eat
manna and are dead : he that eateth this bread
shall live for ever " (St. John vi. 59). What
can impress on us more vividly the qualities of
this Divine Sacrament? It is emphatically the
bread from heaven ; not in the inferior way
in which the manna came down (Ex. vi. 13), but
in the highest sense. It is, as the Church calls it,
The Treasure of the Church. 97
in the Mass : " The holy bread of eternal life and
chalice of everlasting salvation." It is moreover
given to us for the very same reason : without it we
should never be able to find our way across the
desert of this world to the promised land, our
eternal home. To the manna we may join in
idea that pillar of the cloud and pillar of fire
which accompanied the Jews on their journey
(Exod. xiii. 21) ; or, as Saint Paul says : " And
all drank of the same spiritual drink (and they
drank of the spiritual rock that followed them,
and the rock was Christ") (i. Cor. x. 4). This
was with them during the whole of their journey,
and so the Blessed Sacrament is with us from the
time we come to the use of reason till we receive
it on our death beds. Most other Sacraments are
only for special occasions, but this Sacrament is,
like the manna and the spiritual drink of the
Jews (Exod. xvii. 6. — Num. xx. n), given for
our daily needs.
I have already referred to another special type
of the Holy Sacrament — in the hearth-cake
given to Elias — in the strength of which food
he walked " forty days and forty nights, unto
the mount of God, Horeb " (3 Kings xix. 8).
By dwelling sometimes on these types, we
can fill our minds with good thoughts on the
characteristics and qualities of this most Holy
Sacrament. It is the Sacrament of Sacraments.
All Sacraments are the channels of God's grace,
but in this Sacrament we have not merely a
channel of grace, but the very fountainhead
8
98 The Treasure of the Church.
itself. " You shall draw waters with joy out
of the Saviour's fountains " (Is. xii. 3). Or as
our Lord Himself puts it : "If thou didst know
the gift of God, and who he is that saith to thee,
Give me to drink, thou perhaps wouldst have
asked of him, and he would have given thee
living water" (St. John iv. 10).
Of the different names given to the Holy
Eucharist, the one most commonly used amongst
Catholics is the " Blessed Sacrament." We
speak, for instance, of "Visits to the Blessed
Sacrament," of "Benediction of the Blessed
Sacrament," and so forth. Nothing sounds
colder or more irreverent to Catholic ears than to
call the Holy Eucharist, "the Sacrament."
The name given It in the catechisms, and
theological books generally, is the "Holy
Eucharist" The meaning of this is "thanks
giving," and this name is no doubt given
because, as we are told, "the Lord Jesus, the
same night in which He was betrayed, took
bread, and giving thanks, broke and said : . . .
This is my Body" (i Cor. xi. 23-24). The
Eucharistic sacrifice is given to us as the Great
Sacrifice of thanksgiving, which we can offer
to Almighty God in return for all His goodness.
"What shall I render to the Lord for all the
things which He hath given me? I will take the
chalice of salvation and will call upon the name
of the Lord" (Ps. cxv. 12-13).
We have nothing of our own to give, so our
Lord has left us this most precious offering by
The Treasure of the Church. 99
which alone we pay our debt of gratitude to
Him.
We also speak of the Blessed Sacrament as
the "Holy Communion" and this, because in no
other way can we be so intimately united to
our Lord. It is the closest union which man
can have with his Creator on this earth. It
unites us, moreover, not only with our Lord,
but by Him with all His whole Church. " We
being many, are one body in Christ, and every
one members one of another " (Rom. xii. 5).
"I am the vine, you are the branches " (St.
John xv. 5). We are united with each other
only because we are united with our Lord.
The Blessed Sacrament, therefore, is the great
bond of union amongst Christians, " for we
being many are one bread, one body, all that
partake of one bread" (i Cor. x. 17).
During the Mass we speak of the ' ''Host. " After
the Elevation, the priest says: " We offer unto
Thy most excellent Majesty, of Thy gifts and
grants, a pure Host, a holy Host, an immacu
late Host, the holy Bread of eternal life, the
Chalice of everlasting salvation."
This word " Host " means a victim (cf. Kings,
ix. 13), a sacrifice, and is, therefore, the most
appropriate name for the Blessed Sacrament
during the Mass. We use it also every day at
Benediction. " O Salutaris Hostia, Quae coeli
pandis ostium." " O Saving Victim opening
wide the gate of heaven to man below."
One more name is also given to the Blessed
ioo The Treasure of the Church,
Sacrament. When we receive It in the hour of
death it is called the " Viaticum," which means
the food which we take in preparation for our
last journey. We stand in terrible need of
special preparation for that awful journey. The
priest is about to say to us: " Go forth, O
Christian soul, out of this world." Who can
help us in that hour of danger? No one but
our Lord Himself, and He has given us His
Body and Blood to strengthen us on our way
" to the mount of God."
By dwelling on these names given to the
Holy Sacrament we may form to ourselves
some idea of the greatness of the gift which
He has given to us, and the all-important part
which It is designed to have in the work of our
Salvation.
I must now speak of what is called the Scrip
ture proof of the doctrine of the Holy Eucharist,
and although, as I before said, the teaching of the
Church is quite independent of the Scriptures.
That teaching was delivered to mankind, many
years before the New Testament was written,
and therefore cannot be in any way dependent
upon it. As a proof, however, it is as strong
as words can make it. We may truly say that
if we were at liberty to introduce fresh texts of
our own invention, we could hardly put the
doctrine in plainer words than we now find.
There are three parts to this Scripture proof:
(i) The promise, (2) the fulfilment of this promise,
(3) subsequent reference to it. The promise we
The Treasure of the Church. 101
find in St. John's gospel. In his 6th chapter,
the Evangelist gives an account of one of the
two miracles which especially illustrate the
Holy Eucharist, the feeding, that is, of the
five thousand in the desert. Here we seem to
have before our eyes that wonder of the Holy
Eucharist, by which our Lord constantly multi
plies His Body and Blood so as to be food, not
for five thousand, but for countless millions.
With this before our minds, we go on to read
of the spiritual bread of which this is the type ;
that bread which was to be His own Body and
Blood. " I am the living bread, which came
down from heaven. If any man eat of this bread,
he shall live for ever : and the bread that I will
give, is my flesh for the life of the world " (51-52).
To make these clear words clearer still, we
have the words of the Jews which show plainly
that they understood Him exactly as we should
have done. " The Jews, therefore, strove among
themselves, saying : How can this man give us
His flesh to eat ? Then Jesus said to them :
Amen, amen, I say unto you : Except you eat
the flesh of the Son of man and drink His
blood you shall not have life in you. He that
eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood hath
everlasting life, and I will raise him up in the
last day. For my flesh is meat indeed and my
blood is drink indeed " (St. John vi. 53-56).
Can a promise be made more plainly or more
distinctly ? He promises that He will give them
a bread which shall be His bodv and blood.
io2 The Treasure of the Church.
He does not give it, but promises it. He does
not explain how it is to be done, but requires
His apostles to trust Him till the time for the
performance of His promise arrives. And see
how Saint Peter expressed this supreme trust :
" Lord, to whom shall we go? thou hast the
words of eternal life " (St. John vi. 69).
Now let us consider how this promise was
fulfilled. It was the most solemn hour of our
Lord's life, which was to see the completion of
the ancient passover, and the establishment of a
new Pasch.
" In hac mensa novi Regis,
Novum Pascha novae legis
Phase vetus terminal. "
"At the new King's holy table,
Doth the new Law's new Passover
To the old Pasch put an end."
How solemn and important is this moment,
the moment for which Jesus had yearned.
"With desire have I desired to eat this Pasch
with you before I suffer " (St. Luke xxii.
15).
Here, then, with the shadow of His passion
hanging over Him, He gives to His apostles
the bread and the wine, with the words : " This
is my Body, this is my Blood." The apostle
who told us of the promise makes no mention
* From Bishop Bagshawe's translation of the " LaudaSion."
These translations are always most literal and exact.
The Treasure of the Church. 103
of its fulfilment : it seems as if our Lord chose
to give us independent witnesses, and, accord
ingly, we find St. Matthew, St. Mark, and St.
Luke all describing to us, in similar words, the
carrying out of the promise of which St. John
had told us.
But this is not enough. For the completeness
of the proof, we ought to know how the apostles
themselves understood these words and acted on
them. St. Paul is writing to the Corinthians
long after. They were already Christians and
had received from him all the doctrines of the
Christian Church, and he is writing to correct
errors in practice, and only incidentally refers
to the faith which had been taught to them.
See what he says : " For I have received of
the Lord that which I also delivered unto you,
that the Lord Jesus, the same night in which He
was betrayed, took bread, and giving thanks,
broke, and said : Take ye and eat : this is my
body which shall be delivered for you : this do
for the commemoration of me. . . . Therefore
whosoever shall eat this bread, or drink the
chalice of the Lord unworthily, shall be guilty
of the Body and of the Blood of the Lord "
(i Cor. xi. 23-27).
Here, then, we have the promise made some
time before the Passion : we have the literal
fulfilment of it ; we have a reference made long
after when the Holy Eucharist was the daily
life of Christians. All say precisely the same
thing, and declare, as plainly as language can
104 The Treasure of the Church.
express it, that our Lord is truly and really
present. Throughout, there is not a hint of the
possibility of any figurative sense. For com
pleteness we may add St. Paul's beautiful
words : " The chalice of benediction, which we
bless, is it not the communion of the Blood of
Christ? And the bread, which we break, is it not
the partaking of the Body of the Lord ? "
(i Cor. x. 16).
The triple proof, made up of promise, per
formance, and subsequent reference, form together
as strong a testimony as language will admit of.
It is much stronger than anything that can be
deduced from a single passage. It is compara
tively easy to misapprehend the meaning of one
set of words ; but, when you have a number of
passages, quite independent, all agreeing in the
same thing, we cannot well be mistaken.
This Scripture proof, however, strong as it is,
is made indefinitely stronger, if we go to history
and see in what sense our Lord's words were,
in fact, received and interpreted by the early
Fathers and by the Church. The difficulty
which presents itself in showing this is the over
whelming abundance of proof. A writer, who
was an Anglican clergyman when he wrote,
says : " And surely there is no point on which
the judgment of primitive Christians is of more
value than this. For it was a point on which
their judgment was entirely unanimous. On
many subjects the Church was early rent into
parties ; so that at times it was difficult to say
The Treasure of the Church. 105
what doctrine was predominant. But respecting
the Holy Eucharist there existed no symptom of
disagreement for eight centuries and a half."
(Archdeacon Wilberforce on the Holy Eucharist,
P^e 3.)
I have already spoken of the ancient liturgies,
of which, according to the same author, we have
sixty-two of the Eastern, and at least eight of
the Western Church. All these liturgies agree
in professing the real, substantial, objective
presence of the Body and Blood of our Lord ;
and not only profess this belief, but carry it out
by expressing their faith and adoration in the
most glowing terms.
As to the Fathers of the Latin and the Greek
Church, they are so numerous that it would
require a volume to give their testimony. Let
us take one or two. St. Ambrose died in 397.
He was Bishop of Milan in the time of the
Emperor Theodosius. Listen to his words :
" Perchance thou sayest, Here it is my bread
which is used. But that bread is bread only
till the Sacramental words are spoken : at the
consecration, instead of bread there cometh to
be the Body of Christ. This, therefore, let us
establish. How cometh it that that which was
bread becometh the Body of Christ? Through
the consecration. And in what words, and in
whose language, doth the consecration take
place? In those of the Lord Jesus. All the
other things which are said, the ascription of
praise to God, the prayer for the people, for
106 The Treasure of the Church.
kings, and for others which formeth the first
part (of the Canon), these are put in the mouth
of the priest, but when that point is reached,
when this venerable Sacrament is to be con
secrated, then the priest useth no more his own
words, but Christ's. It is the word of Christ,
therefore, which doth the needful work of the
Sacrament. And what is the word of Christ?
It is the word of Him at whose bidding all
things were made. The Lord commanded and
the heavens were created ; the Lord com
manded and the earth was formed ; the Lord
commanded and the seas were made ; the Lord
commanded and all the creatures sprung into
being. Thou seest how mighty-working a word
is the word of Christ. If, then, the word of
Christ hath such power that it can make that
to be which hath never been, wherein doth it
appear greater that it maketh one thing to be
changed into another ? There was once no
heaven ; there was once no sea ; there was
once no earth. But hear Him who saith :
' He spake and it was done, He commanded
and it stood fast.' If, then, I am to answer thee,
I tell thee that before the consecration it was
not the Body of Christ, but after the consecration
it is the Body of Christ, for Himself hath spoken,
and it is done : He hath commanded and it
standeth fast. . . . Therefore it is not idly
that when thou art receiving thou sayest
' Amen ' — testifying in thy heart that That
which thou art taking is the Body of Christ.
The Treasure of the Church. 107
The priest says unto thee : 'The Body ot
Christ,' and thou answereth 'Amen' — that is
to say, 'It is true.' What, then, thy tongue
confesseth, let thine heart hold to " (qth, ^th,
and 6th lessons, Wed., Oct. C.C.*).
Now let us consider a passage, taken almost at
random, from a great Greek Father. St. John
Chrysostom was Patriarch of Constantinople,
and died A.D. 407. He begins : " ' We, being
many, are one body ' (saith the Apostle), and
again, ' We are members of His Body, of His
Flesh, and of His Bones.' Only the initiated
will understand what I say. That this union
may take place, not by love only, but verily and
indeed, we ought to mingle our own with His
Flesh. And this is done by eating that food
which He hath given unto us. . . To this
end He hath mingled Himself with us, and
infused His Body into our bodies, that we may
be one together, like as the limbs of a man and
his head are all of one body. Such union do they
long for that love much " (^.th lesson, Saturday,
Oct. C.C.}.
Such quotations as these from the early
Fathers are exceedingly abundant, but these
two, from the Latin and the Greek Church, are
sufficient for my purpose.
* The authenticity of this passage seems to be doubtful, but
it has long- been included in St. Ambrose's works. If not
written by the saint himself, it is at any rate contemporary,
and bears testimony to the belief of the Church at the time as
clearly as if St. Ambrose himself had written it.
io8 The Treasure of the Church.
Now it may be asked, can any stronger proof
of the Lord's real presence in the Holy Eucharist
be given in the nature of things? I think not;
and yet it practically comes to nothing. No
amount of written evidence will ever convince
mankind of such a doctrine, or, at least, lead
them to any real and practical belief in it.
Nothing short of a living, teaching authority,
appointed by Almighty God, can ever bring
home to the minds of men a doctrine so over
whelming in itself, and so full of practical
consequences as the Real Presence.
St. Philip asked the Eunuch: " Thinkest
thou that thou understandest what thou readest?
Who said : And how can I unless some man
show me?" (Acts viii. 30-31). As St. Peter tells
us: "No prophecy of Scripture is made by
private interpretation " (2 St. Pet. i. 20) — and all
attempts to give a clear and reliable faith, without
the teaching of the Church appointed by God,
have always utterly failed.
Our Lord says : " Do this in commemoration
of me." But you must have some living
authoritative voice to tell you what to do, and
how to do it. You must have some one stand
ing by, able to direct you in difficulties and
emergencies, — in short, able to take charge of
so wonderful a Sacrament. With such an
Authority, men can administer It with peace and
joy ; without this Authority, there must always
be a painful uncertainty and unreality about
it. This, I think, is what we, in fact, find
The Treasure of the Church. 109
amongst our good friends who are out of the
Church.
I said that the Holy Eucharist was a test of
the reality of our faith in the Incarnation ; I
think I may add that it is also a test of our
true faith in the Authority of the Church. If
we really believe that our Lord has appointed a
living Church with full authority to teach us,
there is no difficulty in accepting even this most
wonderful mystery, the mystery of our Lord's
perpetual presence in the Holy Sacrament. It is
difficult, of course, to imagine or to fathom ; a
thousand questions arise about it which we
cannot answer, but, if we believe that this
doctrine is really taught by God, we accept it
without hesitation.
On the other hand, without such a reliable
teaching authority, it is difficult to see how
people can have any clear, certain faith on such a
subject. The written proofs are in themselves,
in the nature of things, more or less vague.
They admit generally of many interpretations,
and abundant contradictory opinions can be
formed, so that a positive conclusion is very
difficult. They leave, moreover, a vast number of
details quite untouched, and yet, without these
details, the administration of the Sacrament is
impossible. At any rate, I think it is clear that
any real hold of the doctrine of the Sacraments
has, in fact, always disappeared when the belief
in the Divine teaching authority of the Church
was abandoned.
no The Treasure of the Church.
I said before that the Holy Eucharist was
called the " Mystery of Faith"; I should like,
therefore, to consider the question of "faith,"
though it is perhaps a digression. St. Paul
says : " Now faith is the substance of things to be
hoped for, the evidence of things that appear
not " (Heb. xi. i).
It is that spiritual faculty that gives a substance
and a reality to the things that we hope for.
Without faith, they are but dreams and shadows,
and cannot reasonably affect our conduct. It is
also the faculty by which alone we can grasp
those things which appear not ; that is, which
we cannot see and feel either physically or
mentally.
Faith, then, according to the Apostle, is an
entirely different thing from that notion of faith
invented by Luther, when he taught that faith
meant a conviction of your own future salvation.
If faith, then, is the substance of what we have
to hope for, it must be the necessary and
essential foundation of all religion. A religion
without faith is like a building without a founda
tion ; that is, a thing of sentiments and fancies,
without any real and reasonable principles. St.
Paul, therefore, goes on to say : " Without faith
it is impossible to please God. For he that
cometh to God must believe that He is, and is
a rewarder to them that seek Him " (Heb. xi. 6).
But now we have to consider that Faith is
specially precious, because it is a foundation.
We can build upon it a great house ; an edifice
The Treasure of the Church. 1 1 1
of many virtues and saintly deeds. On it depend
Hope and Charity, and all the glorious virtues
coming from them. But a foundation with
nothing built upon it is of no use : by itself, it
serves no purpose at all. Therefore St. James
says: " Faith without works is dead" (St.
James ii. 20). It is important to dwell on this,
as all the sects founded on Lutheranism take a
false view of this question, and say that " faith
alone saves us."
What would faith be like without its proper
superstructure of charity ? A man has a great
faith ; that is, he has before him vividly the
substance of all things to be hoped for ; the
Great God, his last end ; the eternal life for which
he is made and destined : and then turns away
from them. He refuses to love or obey that
glorious Lord whom his faith puts before him ;
he refuses to seek that eternal life which is so
clearly presented to him by his faith. Is faith,
under these circumstances, any virtue? Does it
not make his disobedience and want of love, a
thousand times worse than they would otherwise
have been ?
It would be much the same even if you took
the Lutheran idea of faith. Can anything be
more revolting than the idea of a man believing
himself to be sure of eternal life, and yet not
loving or obeying the God who, he believes,
will certainly give it to him !
St. James says: "The devils believe and
tremble " (St. James ii. 19). Are those who
H2 The Treasure of the Church.
believe, and yet refuse to obey, in any better
condition than they ?
Your faith, then, is a foundation, on which
you must build in the most perfect way, with
material worthy of your faith. Remember what
St. Paul says : " Other foundation no man can
lay but that which is laid ; which is Christ
Jesus" (i Cor. iii. 2). Remember your faith
in our Lord is the foundation on which you are
to build, and that " the fire shall try every man's
work of what sort it is" (i Cor. iii. 13).
But let us consider faith in another way : it is
the gift of God. "No man can come to me,
except the Father, who hath sent me, draw him "
(St. John vi. 44). The faith that draws us to
God must, then, be God's gift. We are a little
too much inclined to forget this, and to attach
too much weight to human means.
People sometimes think that their becoming
Catholics is chiefly their own doing ; that it is
their own intelligence that has brought them to
the true faith. Again, we fancy that our
eloquence and reasoning has worked the con
version of others. But, "neither he that
planteth is anything, nor he that watereth, but
God that giveth the increase " (i Cor. iii. 7).
Everyone who is really converted, is converted
by God's grace. Of course, reason has its share.
God does not ask us to believe without reason
able proof ; but that is not sufficient. We need
the gift of God before we can really believe to
our own salvation, and, therefore, earnest prayer
The Treasure of the Church. 113
to God is more important than anything man
can say.
Since faith is God's gift, we must not glorify
ourselves because we possess it. " If thou hast
received, why dost thou glory as if thou hadst
not received?" (i Cor. iv. 7). Again, a gift
needs acknowledgment, and such a gift as that
of the Holy Faith deserves a constant acknow
ledgment and gratitude.
Moreover, a gift is bestowed in order that it
may be used. If a man makes little or no use
of the precious gift of faith, can he be surprised
if the gift is one day taken away from him ?
Alas ! this happens to many : they make no
use of the faith bestowed on them, and some day
the sentence goes forth, " Take it away from
him " (St. Luke xix. 24).
There is another way in which we may look
at faith, and this, I think, deserves much con
sideration. Faith is a worship, an adoration
paid to Almighty God, and is the highest kind
of worship. The Catechism says : "I must
worship God by Faith, Hope and Charity."
We are naturally inclined to ask how these
virtues, great and important as they are, can
properly be called a "worship" of God. The
answer is plain enough. Faith is the worship
of the understanding ; Hope the worship of the
desires ; Charity the worship of the heart. The
understanding is obviously man's highest and
most distinguishing characteristic. It is this
faculty which divides us by an impassable line
9
H4 Th* Treasure of the Church.
from all other creatures, from "the horse and
the mule which have no understanding " (Ps.
xxxi. 9). Faith is that virtue which makes us
acknowledge that this gift, great and glorious as
it is, is, after all, only a spark from Infinite
Intelligence.
If there were no such Infinite Intelligence,
whence could man have acquired this under
standing? He never could have got it from
lesser beings, themselves possessing no such
faculty. By reason and understanding, we
claim kindred with this Infinite Mind, and the
first duty of reason ought to be to acknowledge
the Infinite source from which it proceeds.
By faith, we bow down our understandings,
and compel them to adore and to submit them
selves to this Infinite Wisdom. It makes us
feel that, great as are the powers God has given
us, there is, nevertheless, Something before
which they must bow down with absolute sub
mission ; it shows us that, though we can in
some degree measure and reckon up all created
things, there is still One Who is " immense,"
immeasurable, before Whom all our calculations
fail and are as naught, and all our measuring
rods are useless. The Lord God tells us that
"as the heavens are exalted above the earth,
so are my ways exalted above your ways, and
my thoughts above your thoughts " (Is. Iv. 9).
This act of intellectual submission is the very
essence and foundation of all religion. If you
do not give this homage and adoration, and the
The Treasure of the Church. 115
subjection of the understanding, all other kinds
of adoration are to little or no purpose. It
would seem the simplest and easiest thing in
the world to do this, but to some minds it is
very difficult. They are conscious to themselves,
perhaps, of very great powers, and find it hard
to realise that there is anything which is quite
beyond their grasp. I am afraid people some
times become Catholics without making, or at
least without thoroughly making, this act of
intellectual submission. Their understanding
accepts, perhaps, the truths taught, but never
bows down to the earth before its Creator.
Sooner or later this terrible flaw makes itself
felt, and so, in this way, some of these intel
lectual people fall away.
I have spoken of faith as a necessary founda
tion for anything good, as a gift from God to
man, and as a homage and adoration offered by
men to God. One point more remains. Faith
is a virtue : that is to say, it is something which
requires the exercise and co-operation of our free
will. Nothing in man can be properly called
a virtue in which his free will has no share.
Virtue, moreover, as its name implies, requires
some struggle or exertion to secure it. Faith,
then, like all other virtues, means good will and
exertion on our part. God has made His reve
lation to men sufficiently plain to enable men to
accept it fully ; but not so obvious as to compel
their acquiescence.
This arises largely from the nature of the
1 16 The Treasure of the Church.
truths proposed to us. The truths which come
before our minds in the natural order are
generally things which we can entirely grasp,
and which, therefore, leave no room for diffi
culties or rebellion. In the supernatural order,
however, we " see as in a glass, in a dark
manner" (i Cor. xiii. 12) — and the imagination
has abundant opportunity for rebellion, if en
couraged or allowed to rebel. However strong
the proof, however clear maybe your conviction,
moments will come when everything seems hazy ;
—when all kinds ofpossibleand impossible doubts
will suggest themselves to the mind. A cloud
comes up and covers the sun, and the road, which
just now seemed so plain, appears to be involved
in obscurity. We go on boldly, however, and are
confident that the cloud will pass and our path
become as evident as it was before.
This is exactly what we have to do in matters
of faith : we must go on bravely, through a
sense of duty, though the light seems to have
failed for a moment.
To take an example : you can never have the
slightest doubt that two and two make four.
Your reason and your imagination completely
grasp the whole question ; and no rebellion is
possible. In any mystery of religion it is
different. There is always a vast territory, if I
may use the expression, in which the imagination
has no holding ground : in which a thousand
questions may be asked to which no answer can
be found.
The Treasure of the Church. 117
There are two kinds of belief, or what at times
appear to be belief. There is the belief of the
reason and there is the belief of the imagination.
" Seeing is believing." Yes, because seeing
more or less satisfies the imagination, not
because it necessarily adds to the reasonableness
of conviction. Men want to seize and grasp — if
not with their hands, at least with their eyes and
imagination, and they confound that desire with
the wish for reasonable proof. For instance, St.
Thomas says : " Except I see in His hands the
print of the nails, and put my finger into the
place of the nails, and put my hand into His
side, I will not believe " (St. John xx. 25).
This was not asking for reasonable proof: he
had plenty of that already in the testimony of
the other apostles, and the testimony of his
senses would have added very little. He wanted
something to convince his imagination — not his
reason. He wanted to touch and feel for
himself.
If I might attempt a parallel, I would say :
Supposing that you had never heard of
telegraphs, or electricity in any shape ; and
someone, of whose learning and veracity you
could not possibly doubt, came to you and told
you that you could send a message in a few
seconds to New York by a wire under the sea,
you certainly would believe it. You could not
do otherwise, being quite clear as to the accuracy
of your informant. I think, however, your
imagination would rebel a good deal, and would
n8 The Treasure of the Church.
keep on saying : How on earth can that be? Isn't
it contrary to common sense? If you happened
to live amongst people who derided the notion,
and laughed at you for supposing that by
dabbling some pieces of metal in water here,
you could communicate your thoughts to people
in America — if that was the case, I think you
would have often to recall to your mind the
cogency of the authority on which you had
received the facts, and you would sometimes find
it difficult to stifle misgivings.
A little later, however, when you have felt a
few stiff electric shocks, and sent and received a
dozen messages from friends in America, your
imagination also would be satisfied, and all
possible misgivings would be at an end.
It is something like this in faith. We have
abundance to satisfy our reason, but we cannot,
in the nature of things, gratify our imaginations
in this life — and so they will keep on crying out
occasionally: "How can all this be?'' and
compel us to fall back on the logical grounds of
certainty which we possess, or rather to cry out
to our Lord, with St. Peter : " Lord, to whom
shall I go? Thou hast the words of eternal
life "(St. John vi. 69).
It is this very obscurity and difficulty which
makes the merit of faith. Faith is a virtue,
because it requires a sense of duty, and some
effort, at all times steadily to keep the truths of
faith before the mind.
The virtue of faith has to be guarded, as all
The Treasure of the Church. 119
other virtues have, by care in avoiding dangers.
Those who heedlessly and unnecessarily expose
themselves to danger are very liable to fall. It
is so with every other virtue, and it is so with
faith. When it is your duty to meet dangers
and temptations against faith, you may do so
with impunity — but " he that loveth danger shall
perish in it " (Ecclus. iii. 27).
Like every other virtue, faith must be pre
served and increased by prayer, especially in
moments of temptation. Every Christian, how
ever strong in his faith, ought to have before
him the prayer of the poor father, who, crying
out with tears, said : " I do believe, O Lord ; help
my unbelief " (St. Mark ix. 23).
Virtues, moreover, are cultivated by "acts"
of the virtue. A virtue is a habit of the mind
which generally is dormant, and only occasion
ally is brought into use. If we want this virtue
to abound in us, we must find opportunities of
exercising it, otherwise it is sure to grow dull
and almost lifeless. Faith, then, is a habit of
mind; but an "Act of Faith" is something, in
word or deed, which brings this habit into
energetic exercise.
The highest act of faith, obviously, is the act
of the martyrs. They made the supreme act of
faith by dying for their Faith. We may say,
generally, that things which we do are much
more important acts of any virtue than anything
we can say. If you suffer persecution, even in
a very small way ; if you sacrifice something,
I2O The Treasure of the Church.
or bear some inconvenience ; if you will only
bear to be laughed at for your faith, you are
making a most excellent act of the virtue,
and one which will not lose its reward. St.
Paul says: " You have not yet resisted unto
blood, striving against sin " (Heb. xii. 4).
Alas, how little have we done for our faith !
Commonly speaking, however, by " Acts of
Faith," we mean putting our faith into words,
and expressing it in suitable language. We
find, therefore, that the " Acts of Faith, Hope
and Charity " have a prominent place in the
daily prayers of a Christian.
I have spoken of faith as a worship of Cod
as the worship offered to His Divine Majesty
and Infinite Wisdom by the highest faculty
granted to -man. To complete this subject, I
may, perhaps, be allowed to speak of the
worship offered by the other theological virtues
—Hope and Charity.
Hope is the worship of the desires. By it,
man chooses his Creator as his last end, and as
the supreme and ultimate object of his desires.
Whatever we make our last end is, in a very
true sense, our God. Thus St. Paul speaks
of " covetousness, which is a serving of idols"
(Col. iii. 5). This means that those who make
money their last end are becoming idolaters,
by making money their god. Sometimes it is
money, sometimes it is ambition, or the love
of pleasure or distinction, or the praise of men,
or the love of some human being : it matters
The Treasure of the Church. 121
not, you are serving " the creature rather than
the Creator, Who is blessed for ever " (Rom.
i. 25).
God is our first beginning ; it is He " Who
giveth to all life and breath, and all things " (Acts
xvii. 25). And He must necessarily be our last
end, and whoever turns away from this last
end to any creature whatsoever is guilty of
idolatry by making that creature his god.
Hope, then, is that most necessary homage
and worship of our desires which by right
belongs to God alone.
By Charity, we give to God the worship ot
our affections, of our hearts. By charity, we
acknowledge God as the Infinite source of all
good, from Whom comes everything beautiful
and worthy of love which is to be found in
created beings. By charity, we choose Him
before all creatures, and give to Him that love
of preference which is His by right.
We cannot worship God at all unless we
offer to Him this threefold worship : the worship
of the understanding ; the worship of the desires ;
and the worship of the heart and the will. All
these are carried out by what we call the virtue
of Religion, which consists in those internal
and external acts, by which we put in practice
this threefold worship. " And now there
remain, faith, hope, charity, these three : but
the greater of these is Charity" (i Cor,
xiii. 13.)
CHAPTER VI.
CHRIST, OUR SACRIFICE — THE HOLY MASS.
A worship higher than words. — Sought and found. — Various
kinds of Sacrifice in the Old Law. — They make present
the future Sacrifice of the Cross. — Holy Mass makes
present this One Sacrifice for all times. — Given us to
supply our wants. — Our Sacrifice of Adoration, — of
Praise, — of Thanksgiving, — of Atonement for Sin, — of
Supplication. — Prayers and Ceremonial. — How we may
make this Sacrifice ours. — Elasticity allowed. — Familiarity
with the Liturgy recommended. — Proper of the Mass. —
Ordinary of the Mass. — High Mass. — Incense.
I BEGAN by saying that the primary idea of the
Incarnation was God coming down to His
creatures, that is, "God with us." We cannot
indeed know what would have been the course
of God's Providence if the Human Race had
never fallen into sin, but the general idea of the
Church seems to be that even then, in some way
or other, God would have condescended to put
Himself, in some special way, in communication
with His intelligent creatures.
The angels needed Him as much as we do.
The Treasure of the Church. 123
He is as far removed from them as He is from
us, and it is through the Lord Incarnate that
they address themselves to their infinite Creator :
" Through whom the angels praise thy Majesty,
the dominations adore, the powers tremble, the
heavens and the virtues of the heavens, and the
blessed seraphim do celebrate with united joy "
(Common Preface).
The humility, the sadness and suffering of the
Incarnation all come from sin, and we have to
adore not only God with us, but a Redeemer
come to offer a painful sacrifice to atone for sin.
This brings us to speak of the Sacrifice of the
Mass, which is the second part of the Mystery
of the Holy Eucharist. It is a Sacrament and a
Sacrifice. I have spoken of it as the Sacrament
by which we are united to God, and I must now
consider it as the perpetual Sacrifice, in which
the Offering of Mount Calvary is daily renewed.
We say that the Mass is a Sacrifice ; let us
consider what we mean by a sacrifice. It is
clear that from the beginning of the world till
now, men have always felt that there is, and
must be, a higher worship to be given to God
than mere words. Whether from primeval
tradition or from some instinct inherent in
human nature, it is certain that almost all ages
and all peoples have had the idea of sacrifice :
that is, of offering something or other which
must be sacrificed, which must be slain, burnt
or, in some distinct way, changed, so as to be
removed from common use. This must t)e
124 The Treasure of the Church.
offered to God as a homage to His Majesty, as
an acknowledgment of benefit, a confession of
sin, or for some other specific object.
This we find everywhere, but specially do we
find it in the account given in the Holy
Scriptures of the origin of the human race.
From the moment our first parents were driven
out of Paradise, sacrifices began ; and they
continued, in some shape or other, until the
giving of the Old Law, when they were made,
by God's appointment, the greatest of all
religious rites.
It is hardly necessary to remind you of the
number and variety of the sacrifices commanded
in the Old Law. They had holocausts or whole
burnt offerings ; they had morning and evening
sacrifices. " As I was yet speaking in prayer,
behold the man Gabriel, whom I had seen in the
vision at the beginning, flying swiftly touched
me at the time of the evening sacrifice "
(Dan. ix. 21).
They had sin offerings and offerings of
thanksgiving, and indeed sacrifices for almost
every occasion: sometimes the " blood of oxen
and of goats," sometimes the incense which was
consumed before the Lord.
Read the account of the dedication of
Solomon's temple, and you get some idea of the
sacrifices of the Old Law. " And King Solomon
and all the assembly of Israel, and all that were
gathered together before the ark, sacrificed rams
and oxen without number : so great was the
The Treasure of the Church. 125
multitude of the victims. . . The house of God
was filled with a cloud. Nor could the priests
stand and minister by reason of the cloud. For
the glory of the Lord had filled the house of
God" (2 Par. v. 6-14).
These sacrifices were all offered up, according
to the original meaning of the word. They
were something slain, burned, poured out, or, in
some special way, changed, as a homage to the
Creator of all things and to the Lord of Life and
Death.
It is true we often hear the word used in a
different sense: as, "a sacrifice to God is an
afflicted spirit " (Ps. 1. 19.), "Offer up the sacrifice
of justice, and trust in the Lord " (Ps. iv. 6),
and similar passages. These, however, merely
mean that these internal feelings have an analogy
with the outward sacrifices commanded in the
law.
Now let us consider the meaning of these
sacrifices. It is clear that the things offered to
God were not valuable or important in them
selves, but must have had reference to something
much higher ; and the Christian revelation ex
plains to us exactly what their object was. They
were intended to represent, that is, in a sense,
to make present to each age that wonderful and
adorable Sacrifice which alone could have any
value before God. That Sacrifice was afar off :
many ages must pass before that Sacred Victim
was to appear and offer Himself for the sins of
men. His Sacrifice was for all time. He was
126 The Treasure of the Church.
"the Lamb which was slain from the beginning
of the world " (Ap. xiii. 8). He was always
before the throne of God " the Lamb standing
as it were slain " (Ap. v. 6). Still, according
to the designs of God, there must be something
to make each generation partakers of it. This
explains to us the meaning of all those sacri
fices the Jews were commanded to offer.
St. John Chrysostom says : " And could the
blood of a sheep save a man ? Yea, in good
sooth : not because it was blood, but because it
represented in a figure the Blood of the Lord.
The statues of monarchs, mindless and speech
less images, though they be, have sometimes
been an helpful refuge to men endowed with
soul and reason ; not because they are works of
a brazier's skill, but because the likeness they
bear is a king's. And just so did this uncon
scious blood deliver the lives of men, not because
it was blood, but because it foreshadowed the
shedding of the Blood of Jesus " (Feast of
the Precious Blood, ^th and $th lessons ).
This, then, is the wondrous plan and design
of God, by which He made the Sacrifice of
Calvary present to all ages, and gave each
generation, a part in it : and this, perhaps, not
only in His chosen people, but amongst those
nations which knew not God, but were, to use
St. Paul's words " seeking God, if happily they
may feel after Him or find Him " (Acts xvii.
27).
Such a plan was for all time, and not to cease
The Treasure of the Church. 127
when the Great Sacrifice had been accomplished.
It was still to be made present to all ages which
succeeded as it had been to those which went
before, and therefore we too must have our
Sacrifice.
Wonderfully has this been done by our Lord
in the Holy Eucharist. He has given us His
Body and Blood as our perpetual Sacrifice, the
constant representation and memorial and the
daily renewal of His most Sacred Passion.
In the Blessed Sacrament, then, we have two
things to consider, ist: It is the continuation
and completion of His Incarnation, by which
He gives to each age and to each country
that special communication of His Divine
Presence which His Incarnation brought to the
human race. 2nd : He makes us partakers of
that sacrifice which He offered up for us as
sinners.
It is a memorial of the Passion. " Do this
in commemoration of Me." What can more
forcibly and more fully remind us of His Passion,
than the Presence of that very glorious Body
which He raised from the dead? When Jesus,
after His Resurrection, stood in the midst of
His Apostles and showed them His Glorious
Body, His hands and His side, He was giving
them the most perfect memorial of His Cruci
fixion and death that can be conceived.
So also does His Eucharistic Presence most
perfectly remind us of all He has done for us,
not indeed to sight, but to our faith. " He hath
The Treasure of the Church.
made a remembrance of His wonderful works.
. . . He hath given food to them that fear
Him" (Ps. ex. 4,5). If this food had been
nothing but ordinary food — if it had been mere
bread and wine — how could it have been a
memorial of His most wonderful and blessed
Passion ?
But it is not only a memorial, it is a renewal.
" You shall show the death of the Lord until He
come" (i Cor. xi. 26). Our Lord's natural
death is most truly shown by His mystical
death, as represented by the separate Conse
cration of the bread and wine. By this our
Lord is on the altar, "standing as it were
slain."
It is also a sacrifice given to supply our wants,
and to enable us to worship our God as we
ought. We have nothing of our own in the
least worthy of His acceptance, and therefore
He has given to us a great gift which must
always be acceptable, since it is the offering ol
One Who "is heard for His reverence " (Heb.
v. 7).
We have a great debt to pay our Creator.
He has made us, and every day He preserves
and watches over us : every day, therefore, we
ought by prayer to enter His Presence and do
something to pay our debt. This offering of at
least some fervent prayer every day is perhaps
the very first of a Christian's duty. He has to
speak to His God, to acknowledge Him as His
Master and praise Him. But this is not enough.
The Treasure of the Church. 129
He needs a sacrifice which will enable Him
adequately to pay the debt he owes.
What is this debt? First an acknowledgment
of God's supreme dominion, and that we, His
creatures, are but dust and ashes in His Presence.
u All nations are before Him as if they had no
being at all, and are counted to Him as nothing
and vanity " (Isaias xl. 17). For this end is the
Mass, our holocaust, offered, as were the whole-
burnt offerings of the Jews, to God alone as the
supreme Lord. And we owe to our Lord, more
over, an immense and ever increasing debt of
praise. The Holy Scripture is full of praise :
"Give praise to the Lord, for He is good ; for
His mercy endureth for ever. . . . Let
them that fear the Lord now say, that His mercy
endureth for ever " (Ps. cxvii. 1-4). " Blessed
be the name of the Lord, from henceforth now
and for ever. From the rising of the sun unto the
going down of the same, the name of the Lord
is worthy of praise " (Ps. cxii. 2, 3). We think
too little of this great duty of praising our
Creator, yet : " What can be less than to afford
Him praise, the easiest recompense, and pay
Him thanks, how due ! "
The Mass is our Sacrifice of praise, our thank
offering, our Eucharistic Sacrifice. So, again,
the Jews had provided for them offerings for sin.
When men had sinned, it was not enough for
them to repent : they must also offer up the
sacrifice appointed to atone for sin. So the
Holy Mass is offered by the priest " for my
10
130 The Treasure oj the Church.
innumerable sins, offences and negligences, and
for all around, and for all faithful Christians
living and dead."
We have also a vast number of wants ; we
are dependent on God's bounty every day :
4 'Thou openeth Thy hand, and filleth every
living creature with benediction " (Ps. cxliv. 16).
St. Paul says : ' " Be nothing solicitous ; but in
everything by prayer and supplication, with
thanksgiving, let your petitions be made known
to God" (Phil. iv. 6).
Every day we have our petitions to present
before the throne, and God has given us a most
acceptable sacrifice which will always be before
Him as an odour of sweetness. Our Lord is
"always living to make intercession for us"
(Heb. vii. 25). And this intercession He con
stantly renews in the most Holy Sacrifice which
He has left us.
The Holy Mass is, then, a perpetual Sacrifice
by which His Passion is made present to men
in every generation, and which is constantly
offered for all the ends and objects for which
the many sacrifices of the Old Law were
instituted.
The Catechism tells us that : "The Sacrifice
of the Mass is offered for four ends : first, to give
supreme honour and glory to God ; secondly, to
thank Him for all His benefits ; thirdly, to obtain
pardon for our sins ; and fourthly, to obtain all
other graces and blessings through Jesus Christ."
This Sacrifice is offered up for all men, for the
The Treasure of the Church. 131
whole Church and all Christian people ; but it
may also be offered for individuals. In the Old
Law there were many sacrifices offered publicly
for the whole community, but each member of
the community might have sacrifices offered for
himself and his own spiritual and temporal
interests. These special sacrifices were not only
allowed, but on many occasions, men were com
manded to offer them (v.g. Lev. xii. 6-8;
xiv. 4). In the same way our Lord has left us
the sacrifice of His own Body and Blood to be
offered as occasion requires, not only for the
general wants of the Church, but according to
the intentions and wishes of individuals.
This consideration naturally brings in the
question of the offerings made by the faithful in
return for Masses celebrated for their intentions.
These things are strictly regulated by the
Church, but have, most unreasonably, been
made a ground of complaint against Catholics,
It may be desirable later on to go more fully
into the course of action the Church adopts in
this matter.
We must now consider the prayers and cere
monial used by the Church in the offering of
this Holy Sacrifice.
The first point I will take is one which is
small in itself, but which is the first to attract
the notice of strangers : that is, the language
which the Church uses in the celebration of the
Mass. The Mass and all the Eucharistic and
Sacramental prayers used by the Church are
132 The Treasure of the Church.
in Latin. This applies only to the Western
Church. There are many different liturgies in
the East, which are in Greek, Syriac and other
Oriental tongues. These, however, generally
are quite as distinct from the ordinary vernacular
language of those countries, as Latin is from the
languages spoken in Europe.
One of the first difficulties, then, which strikes
a Protestant entering our churches is the
language. "What is the use of attending a
service in a tongue which I cannot understand? "
Such is the very natural complaint that people
make. Nothing could be more reasonable, if
the Mass were intended to be a form of Common
Prayer ; but it is not. This is obvious, not
only from the language, but from the attitude
the priest assumes, with his back to the people,
and, most of all, from the fact that the greater
part of the Mass is recited secretly. It is not a
form of Common Prayer, but a great action, at
which the people are invited to assist : it is a
solemn sacrifice offered to God in which the
people can take part without hearing or joining
in one word that is said. The bystanders can
join as I before said, just as the people standing
without joined with Zachary, as he was offering
incense, although they could not see him, nor
hear his words (St. Luke i. 21).
Those who are assisting at Mass may be
saying entirely different prayers and yet may
all be joining most fully and most fervently in
the Sacrifice which is being offered. If the
Ttie Treasure of the Church. 133
Mass was said in English and so that everyone
might, and must hear, there would be no room
for these different ways of hearing Mass.
I think it desirable to put in here a beautiful
description of the Mass by Cardinal Newman.
It is supposed to be an account given by a
young convert to some Protestant friends who
had been making objections. " I declare, to
me," he says, " to me nothing is so consoling,
so thrilling, so overcoming, as the Mass, said as
it is among us. I could attend Masses for ever,
and not be tired. It is not a mere form of words,—
it is a great action, the greatest action that can
be on earth. It is, not the invocation merely,
but, if I dare to use the word, the evocation of
the Eternal. He becomes present on the altar
in flesh and blood, before whom angels bow and
devils tremble. This is that awful event which
is the scope, and is the interpretation, of every
part of the solemnity. Words are necessary,
but as means, not as ends ; they are not mere
addresses to the Throne of grace, they are instru
ments of Avhat is far higher, of consecration, of
sacrifice. They hurry on as if impatient to fulfil
their mission. Quickly they go, the whole is
quick ; for they are all parts of one integral
action. Quickly they go ; for they are awful
words of sacrifice, they are a work too great to
delay upon ; as when it was said in the begin
ning, ' What thou doest, do quickly.' Quickly
they pass ; for the Lord Jesus goes with them,
as He passed along the lake in the days of His
134 The Treasure of the Church.
flesh, quickly calling first one and then another.
Quickly they pass ; because as the lightning
which shineth from one part of the heaven unto
the other, so is the coming of the Son of Man.
Quickly they pass ; for they are as the words of
Moses, when the Lord came down in the cloud,
calling on the name of the Lord as He passed by,
1 the Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious,
long-suffering, and abundant in goodness and
truth.' And, as Moses on the mountain, so we too
'make haste and bow our heads to the earth, and
adore.' ... So we all around, each in his place,
with his own heart, with his own wants, . . .
with his own prayers, separate but concordant,
watching what is going on, watching its pro
gress, uniting in its consummation ; — not pain
fully and hopelessly following a hard form of
prayer from beginning to end, but, like a concert
of musical instruments, each different, but
concurring in a sweet harmony, we take
our part with God's priest, supporting him,
yet guided by him. There are little children
there, and old men, and simple labourers,
and students in seminaries, priests preparing
for Mass, priests making their thanksgiving ;
there are innocent maidens, and there are
penitent sinners ; but out of these many minds
rises one eucharistic hymn, and the great Action
is the measure and scope of it. And ....
you ask me whether this is not a formal,
unreasonable service, — it is wonderful ! quite
wonderful. When will these dear, good people
The Treasure of the Church. 135
be enlightened? " (" Loss and Gain" \ \th edition^
P- 3270
This is a long extract, but I know of nothing
which puts the idea and meaning of the Mass
more vividly before us.
This gives a great idea of the elasticity which
the practice of the Church allows. Nothing
shows the wisdom and beauty of her arrange
ments better than the marvellous attraction
which the Holy Mass possesses. Go into any
great church at home or abroad and you find
people hearing Mass, all the morning, day after
day, year after year, and never tired.
In fact, the Protestant and the Catholic forms
of devotion take an entirely different tone. The
Protestant clergyman seems to say, — be this said
with all respect, — "Come and listen to me; I
am reading prayers and passages from the Bible,
and I am preaching. You have, it is true, all
these prayers in your own books — but come and
hear me read them out to you and it will greatly
profit you." And his people go to church, as
the song says, to "hear the parson pray and
preach." The Catholic priest takes an entirely
different tone. " Come to church," he says, " to
adore our Lord really present in the Holy
Eucharist ; — a great Sacrifice is to be offered to
God, ' my sacrifice and yours,' in which you
have to take part. This you can do in any
manner that best suits your devotion. I,
personally, am nothing, and you are not called
upon to trouble yourself about my words. You
136 The Treasure of the Church.
have to be face to face with our Lord, and to
Him you must attend."
This applies to the Holy Mass and Bene
diction, and all the liturgical offices of the
Church. In private and popular devotions, in
sermons and instructions, it is very different.
These of course are in English, or the language
of the country, and the people naturally listen
to the priest and join with him.
The advantages of using the Latin language
are very obvious. It is a language which goes
on, substantially unchanged, from age to age.
The very words which are now in use were used
long before any modern language was in
existence. There was no English, nor French,
nor German when the Mass was first celebrated
in the countries where those languages are now
spoken. If it had been necessary to alter the
Mass as the dialects spoken changed ; if it had
been necessary to translate it into the language
of every half-civilized nation that embraced the
faith, it would have been difficult or impossible
to keep the meaning unchanged throughout the
world. The words of the liturgy are not merely
words of devotion, they are words of power,
words given by our Lord as instruments of
great spiritual works, and the most essential
thing is to preserve them unchanged.
How, then, are we to assist at Mass? This
is a most important question. Hearing Mass
is one of the first of Christian duties, and
yet there are numbers of people who take
The Treasure of the Church. 137
very little trouble to learn how they are to
assist at it with devotion and profit. They are
anxious to go to Mass, so as to fulfil their
obligation, but they have very vague notions
of what they are to do when they get there.
The first thing, obviously, is to have a proper
idea of the Sacrifice, and of the part in it which
belongs to them. They do not go to "look on,"
as Protestants seem to imagine ; they do not go
to be attracted by the music and ceremonial.
They are going to participate in the fruits of a
great Sacrifice offered on their behalf, and at
the same time to take their share in offering it.
"Brethren, pray that my sacrifice and yours
may be acceptable before the Eternal Father."
These are the words the priest addresses to
the congregation just when the most solemn
part of the Mass is beginning.
In order to do this, and to do it well, no
particular form of prayer is required. You can
do it by using the words which are said by the
priest at the altar, which you can find in every
prayer book ; or you may use, instead, some
simpler form of words in which the same senti
ments are expressed. These are commonly
called " Prayers at Mass." Again, you may
meditate during the Mass : you may take, for
instance, any part of our Lord's life or Passion
and dwell upon it, with appropriate prayers.
This is an excellent method of hearing Mass for
some people, since the Mass is the memorial of
the whole of our Lord's life. It commemorates
138 The Treasure of the Church.
His Passion, but it also commemorates His Incar
nation, His Nativity, and the glorious mysteries
of His Resurrection and Ascension. Some
people say the Rosary during Mass, and if
they really try to make the Rosary the medi
tation it is intended to be, no devotion can be
more suitable.
It is very desirable and almost necessary,
however, for most people to use a book or some
outward means to assist devotion. You find
people professing to attend at Mass without any
book, relying on their own mental efforts, but
few can do this effectively, and the practice
commonly leads to endless distractions. Books,
however, should be used to direct our own
thoughts, not to supersede them ; and no prayer
is very satisfactory unless you put into it a good
deal of your own mind and your own words.
In order to hear Mass well you ought to be
tolerably familiar with the liturgy. You need
not always use the Church's words, but you
cannot understand the Mass well unless you
know them.
Every well educated person ought, I think,
to know the Missal, so as to be able to find out
the whole of the prayers used. At the present
day, a great many people hardly ever use the
Missal, and can scarcely find their places in it.
Doubtless they think they have found devotions
which suit them better, but it is, I think, a great
mistake to neglect the Church's own words.
To many it is enough to know the " Ordinary
The Treasure of the Church. 139
of the Mass," which is to be found in almost
every prayer book. We may say here that
all Masses are substantially the same. We
hear of many different Masses : of Masses of the
Blessed Virgin, of the saints, and of the dead ;
we speak of votive Masses, and so forth. The
difference between them, however, is very small ;
the Collects, the Epistles and Gospels, the
verses of Scripture which make up the Introit,
Gradual, Offertory and Communion vary, being
taken from the " Proper of the Mass," but
all that belongs to the Sacrifice is precisely
the same in every Mass. The Mass, moreover,
is always offered up for precisely the same
general intention — that is, for the honour and
glory of God, to whom alone sacrifice can be
offered.
It is, perhaps, as well here to give a list ot
the prayers and devotions found in the Proper
of the Mass, which generally change every day.
There are four sets of versicles, generally taken
out of Scripture. These are the " Introit" or
"Entering in," when the priest goes up to the
altar; the " Gradual," between the Epistle and
Gospel, so called, because it was sung whilst
the deacon was going up the steps to read the
Gospel to the people; the " Offertory," a few
verses before the priest offers the Host and the
Chalice; the " Communion " as soon as the
priest has finished the regular prayers after
receiving Holy Communion.
The Proper contains also the "Epistle" and
140 The Treasure of the Church.
" Gospel " for each day. The Gospel is always
taken from one of the four Gospels, and the
Epistle from some other part of the Bible,
generally from one of the Epistles.
On each day there are three sets of prayers,
which correspond, namely : the " Collects," after
the Gloria; the " Secrets," immediately before
the Preface ; and the " Post Communion," after
the Communion. Sometimes there is one of each,
sometimes more, as you may have commemora
tions of other feasts occurring on the same day,
prayers commanded by the bishop, and so forth,
but there are always as many Secrets and Post
Communions as there are Collects.
The " Secrets " and " Post Communions"
almost always refer to the Sacrifice about to be
offered, or which has just been offered. Accord
ingly, we find that in the English Common
Prayer Book, the Secrets and Post Com
munions are omitted, whilst the Collects are
retained. Those who compiled the Prayer Book
evidently intended to leave out everything re
ferring to the Mass as a Sacrifice.
Besides these there are, occasionally, prayers
which are in verse of some kind, though
generally called " Proses." For instance, the
"Victims Paschali," for Easter; the " Veni
Sancte Spiritus," at Pentecost; the " Lauda
Sion," for Corpus Christi ; the " Stabat Mater,"
for some feasts of Our Lady ; and the " Dies
Iras," in Masses for the dead. These are read
after the Gradual.
The Treasure of the Church. 141
I will now consider in detail some of the
prayers used in the Ordinary of the Mass, as
this is the best way of understanding how to
join in the Sacrifice. If we see how the Church
presents her petitions before the throne of grace,
we shall understand how best to offer our own.
We may divide the Mass roughly into three
parts : the Preparation, the Action and the
Thanksgiving. The Preparation is from the
beginning to the Canon : the Action is the
Consecration and Communion which are con
tained in the Canon of the Mass, and the
concluding prayers are the Thanksgiving.
In the first place, observe how the priest begins.
He is about to perform the most solemn office
which can be committed to men. He is to stand
before the altar in the person of Christ, lending,
if we may say so, his tongue and his hands to
our Lord, Who as the Great High Priest, exer
cises His ministry through His representative.
He is clothed in those venerable and sacred
vestments, which have been used by the Church
for so many ages. They represent the vest
ments of the High Priest in the Old Law, when
he was to enter into the Holy of Holies : well
may they do so, since the Holy of Holies was
but a type of the Christian altar !
Before the priest takes upon himself so high
an office, it is becoming that, for a few moments,
he should stand at the foot of the altar in his
own character as a poor sinner: "I will go
unto the Altar of God : of God Who giveth joy
142 The Treasure of the Church.
to my youth." This is the keynote of the whole
psalm he recites (Ps. xlii). First, he asks
for a favourable judgment: " Judge me, O
God." A judgment, as the Psalmist says :
" According to the judgment of those who
love Thy Name " (Ps. cxviii. 132). Then he
petitions for light: " Send forth Thy light and
Thy truth." He is approaching to Him Who
4 * dwells in light inaccessible," and he begs for
some ray of that divine light. " Hope in God,
for I will still give praise to Him, the Salvation
of my countenance and my God " : deeply as he
feels his unworthiness, still he hopes and desires
to confess to the Lord and " sing His praises on
the harp."
Can we begin our prayer in any better way
than this? " Before prayer, prepare thy soul,
and be not like a man that temptethGod " (Ecclus.
xviii. 23). So says Holy Scripture, and certainly
many of our prayers are spoiled for want of due
preparation. The first idea of prayer is to go up
to the mountain of God ; to present ourselves on
His holy hill, to adore and hold communion with
Him ; and this is specially the idea of Holy
Mass.
We ought, then, to begin our prayers by
endeavouring mentally to ascend to that moun
tain and enter that presence. " Who shall
ascend into the mountain of the Lord, or who
shall stand in His holy place? The innocent ol
hands and the clean of heart" (Ps. xxiii. 3, 4).
How zealously should we endeavour to purify
The Treasure of the Church. 143
our hearts before entering into the presence of
God. This is what the priest does before he
begins Mass : he recites the " Confiteor,"
declaring himself to be a sinner before God and
the whole host of heaven, especially before the
holy apostles, the first priests, whose priestly
office he now holds — those apostles whom our
Lord appointed to " sit on twelve thrones,
judging the twelve tribes of Israel " (St. Matt,
xix. 28).
First, the priest, and then all the people
present, by the minister who represents them,
declare that they have sinned by thought, word
and deed, and ask for pardon, absolution and
remission of their sins ; and when he goes up
to the altar the priest says : " Take away from
us our iniquities, we beseech Thee, O Lord, that
we may be worthy with pure minds to enter into
the Holy of Holies."
The same idea is expressed in the " Kyrie,"
which is recited a little later : this is the three
fold petition for mercy to the three Persons
of the Blessed Trinity, which the priest makes
immediately after the " Introit," the entrance
prayer with which the Mass begins. The
Kyrie is in Greek, and seems a survival
from the time when Greek was used as well as
Latin in the Western Church.
The "Gloria in Excelsis " is said everyday
except in penitential times, and at votive Masses
and Masses for the dead. In this glorious
canticle of the angels, the priest offers that tribute
144 The Treasure of the Church.
of praise from himself and his people, which is
the daily debt of man to God. " Hope in God,
for I will still 'give praise to Him." " We praise
Thee, we bless Thee, we adore Thee, we glorify
Thee, we give Thee thanks for Thy great glory :
O Lord God, heavenly King, God the Father
Almighty. Thou only art holy, Thou only art
Lord, Thou only art most high." Can any
human words rise more like incense before God,
or more suitably usher in the great Sacrifice of
Praise?
The "Nicene" Creed comes after the Gospel on
all Sundays and most of the principal feasts ;
and especially on the feasts of the Blessed
Virgin Mary, of the Apostles, and doctors of
the Church, but not on other days. These
prayers form the first part of the preparation for
the Sacrifice.
After this we come to the " Oblation," that is
the preparation and offering of the bread and
wine which are to be consecrated. The priest
says : " Accept, O Holy Father, Almighty and
Eternal God, this immaculate Host, which I Thy
unworthy servant offer unto Thee, my Living
and true God, for my innumerable sins, offences,
and negligences, and for all here present."
4 ' This immaculate Host," not as mere bread
and wine, but as that which is presently to be
changed into the Body and Blood of our Lord,
in order that, as the next prayer says, " by the
mystery of this water and wine, we may be
made partakers of His Divinity, who vouch-
The Treasure of the Church. 145
safed to become partaker of our humanity." The
priest then offers the Chalice with the words :
"We offer unto Thee, O Lord, the Chalice of
Salvation, beseeching Thy clemency, that, in the
sight of Thy Divine Majesty, it may ascend
with the odour of sweetness for our salvation
and that of the whole world."
What can the Chalice of Salvation be but the
Blood of Christ once more poured out mystically
for us in Sacrifice ? In every line of these
prayers, and throughout the Mass, we read or
sacrifice to God — the highest and greatest
sacrifice ever offered to Him — the sacrifice of
the Body and Blood of Christ.
The Oblation concludes with a beautiful
prayer, which should be often on our lips :
"In the spirit of humility, and with a contrite
heart, let us be received by Thee, O Lord : and
grant that the Sacrifice we offer in Thy sight,
may be pleasing to Thee, O Lord God. Come !
O Sanctifier, Almighty and Eternal God, and
bless this Sacrifice prepared to Thy Holy
Name."
May we not here think of the prophet Elias,
how he "built with the stones an altar to the name
of the Lord," and poured water on " the burnt
offering and upon the wood," and " the fire of
the Lord fell and consumed the holocaust, and
the wood, and the stones, and the dust, and licked
up the water that was in the trench " ? (3 Kings
xviii. 32-38). So the Church prepares her
sacrifice that the fire of God may descend and
ii
146 The Treasure of the Church.
transform the things offered into a sacrifice
worthy of Himself.
At High Mass now comes the solemn
incensing of the altar, and it will be well to
say a word about the use of incense, especially
as it has taken such a prominent place in the
controversies of the day. Burning incense is one
of the oldest and commonest ways of showing
reverence to God. We constantly read of the
altar of incense, and of the offering of incense,
in Holy Scripture, and it seems to have been
generally used amongst all pagan nations with
the same idea.
The feeling of the Church can best be seen
from the prayers used in the blessing and
offering up of the incense : " May the Lord,
by the intercession of Blessed Michael the
Archangel, standing at the right hand of the
altar of incense, and of all His elect, bless this
incense, and receive it as an odour of sweetness."
" Let my prayer, O Lord, ascend like incense in
Thy sight, and the lifting up of my hands be as
an evening sacrifice."
The burning of incense takes us back to the
ancient ' ' altar of incense" (Exod. xxx.), and at the
same time is an emblem of prayer, which ought to
rise before the throne of God as a sweet savour.
May we say that it ought to come from a
burning heart, as the incense does from the hot
coals ?
St. John, in his vision, tells us that : " Another
angel came and stood before the altar, having a
The Treasure of the Church. 147
golden censer : and there was given to him much
incense that he should offer of the prayers of all
the saints upon the golden altar, which is before
the throne of God. And the smoke of the
incense of the prayers of the saints ascended
up before God, from the hand of the angel "
(Apoc. viii. 3, 4).
The Church uses incense, first, as a mark of
reverence to the Blessed Sacrament. At Bene
diction and Exposition of the Blessed Sacra
ment, the first thing is for the priest to incense
the Blessed Sacrament on his knees. Can
anything be more suitable and appropriate as
a mark of reverence ? If we have amongst us
the Real Presence of Jesus Christ, it is clear
that we cannot avoid these or similar signs of
homage ; on the other hand, if we have nothing-
particular to venerate, incense would certainly
seem superfluous.
Besides this, however, incensing is used as a
mark of respect for other things. The altar,
the relics of the saints, the bishop, the priests, the
ministers present, and, lastly, the people, are all
incensed. The censer is swung before them,
however, standing. It is only the Blessed
Sacrament, and the relic of the true Cross,
to which incense may be offered on the
knees.
At High Mass the altar is incensed twice —
once before the Introit, and more solemnly at
the Offertory. The priest incenses the bread and
wine which have been offered,and also the Crucifix
148 The Treasure of the Church.
and the altar, with the words I have quoted
above. At the Gospel the deacon incenses the
book of the Gospels, and at the Consecration
the Blessed Sacrament is incensed by the
ministers.
The High Mass, of which we have been
speaking, is in all substantial things precisely
the same as all other Masses, only at the solemn
Mass the Church seems to linger lovingly over
every detail in a way whrch time will not allow
on ordinary occasions. The celebrating priest
is assisted by a deacon and a subdeacon in their
appropriate vestments. The Kyrie, the Gloria,
and the Credo are sung by the choir, as if to
impress these solemn words on the hearts of the
people, and the priest sits down till they are
concluded.
After the Oblation comes the " Lavabo"; that
is, the priest washes his hands at the corner of
the altar, with the appropriate words out of
Psalm xxv. : " I will wash my hands among the
innocent and will compass Thy altar, O Lord."
This ceremony may well remind us of the
" molten sea " and the " lavers of brass "
(3 Kings vii. 23-26.) which were placed in
Solomon's temple for purification during the
sacrifices.
A very solemn offering to the Blessed Trinity
follows, and then the priest concludes this part
of the Mass with the " Orate fratres," the
prayer I have before quoted, which is addressed
to the congregation : " Brethren, pray that my
The Treasure of the Church. 149
sacrifice and yours may be acceptable to God the
Father Almighty."
This first part of the Mass used to be called the
Mass of Catechumens, because those not yet
baptised were allowed to assist at it. In those
days when the great mysteries of the Faith were
so carefully guarded from profane eyes, none
but the " initiated " were allowed to be present
at the more solemn part of the Mass. Until
they were baptised they were not instructed in
the mysteries of the Holy Eucharist. This is
clearly explained by St. Augustine. He says :
" Behold Nicodemus and they that were with
him believed in Jesus, but Jesus did not commit
Himself unto them. Just so are all Cate
chumens : they believe in the name of Christ,
but Jesus hath not yet committed Himself unto
them. Now, I trust you will be good enough
to pay attention and understand what I am
going to say. If ye ask a Catechumen :
' Dost thou believe in Christ ? ' he saith : ' I
believe ,' and he signeth himself with the sign of
the Cross. The Cross of his Lord is marked
upon his forehead, and he is not ashamed of it.
Behold he believeth in the Name of Christ. But
let us ask him : * Dost thou eat the flesh of the
Son of Man ? ' he knoweth not what we mean :
Jesus hath not yet committed Himself unto
him " (8th and gth lessons. Feast of the Finding
of the Cross).
The " Preface," with which the Canon
commences, is one of the grandest prayers
150 The Treasure of the Church:
in human language, and the old Gregorian
chant which the Church uses is amongst
the simplest and most striking melodies ever
composed.
The Preface varies with the times of the year,
and there is a special Preface for our Lady and
for the Apostles, but they all have the same
solemn tone: " It is truly meet and just, right
and salutary, that we should always, and in all
places, give thanks to Thee, O Holy Lord,
Father Almighty, Eternal God, through Jesus
Christ our Lord." " With angels and archangels,
Thrones and Dominations, and with all the
army of heaven, we sing a hymn to thy glory,
saying without ceasing, Holy, Holy, Holy Lord
God of Sabaoth. Heaven and earth are full of
Thy glory. Hosanna in the highest."
These Prefaces are all found in the Missal, and
people sometimes lose their way amongst them,
not at once understanding that one only is said
each day.
At the end of the Preface, at the words
" Sanctus, Sanctus, Sanctus " the bell rings, and
the people are warned to pay special attention
to the solemn part of the Sacrifice now close
at hand. You will then generally see those
who have been seated kneeling down, and those
who have been engaged in other devotions
putting them aside for the moment.
The " Canon" begins with a prayer begging
God to accept " these gifts, these presents, these
holy unspotted sacrifices " — haec dona, haec
The Treasure of the Church. 151
munera, haec sancta sacrificia illibata — "as an
offering in behalf, first, of the Catholic Church
throughout the world, and particularly for the
Pope and our own bishop, and then for all the
living members of the Church, particularly for
those present."
Then conies the " Communicantes," the prayer
making mention of all the saints. "You are
come to Mount Sion, and to the city of the
living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to the
company of many thousands of angels, and to
the Church of the first-born, who are written in
the heavens, and to God the judge of all, and to
the spirits of the just made perfect" (Heb. xii.
22-23). The Catholic Church cannot on solemn
occasions approach to the throne of God, and
ignore and forget that glorious body of saints
and angels which surround His throne. They
are her members by the communion of saints,
and she must come before the great Creator
joining hands and voices with the citizens of
that blessed kingdom — "Communicating and
honouring in the first place the memory of the
glorious and ever Virgin Mary, of all the blessed
apostles and martyrs, and all the saints." The
great sacrifice is to be offered up in the presence
of the whole Court of Heaven, and the Church on
earth calls on her glorified brethren to join with
her in offering it.
And now the priest spreads his hands over
the chalice, and prays the Lord to "accept this
oblation of our service," and "to dispose our
152 The Treasure of the Church.
days in Thy peace, and to command us to be
delivered from eternal damnation, and to be
numbered in the flock of Thy elect."
May we not consider the priest, in this action,
as laying upon that Sacred Victim the burden
of our sins and troubles, that He may make
atonement for them? Then comes the prayer
that this oblation may " become to us the Body
and Blood of Thy most beloved Son, Jesus
Christ our Lord."
This is a very characteristic prayer and one of
those found in all ancient liturgies. " They all
contain :
1. Prayers for the dead.
2. A narrative of the institution of the Holy
Eucharist, which is almost word for word the
same in every Liturgy, except the Ethiopian,
and yet is not taken from any of the Scripture
accounts.
3. A prayer that God will make or change
the bread and wine into the Body and Blood of
Christ.
4. They declare that a mystery and sacrifice
are celebrated. . . .
5. The mixture of water with wine is named
in each. . . .
6. The use of the sign of the Cross.
7. And probably, also, the invocation of
saints in terms more or less direct." *
When the priest extends his hands over the
* Faith of Catholics, Vol. //., 779.
The Treasure of the Church. 153
chalice, the bell rings — the warning bell, it is
sometimes called. This gives notice that the
" Consecration "is immediately at hand, and you
then see every head bowed, waiting to adore
our Lord the moment that He comes on the
altar.
In the solemn silence that follows, the priest
secretly pronounces the words of Consecration —
our Lord's own words — and immediately kneels
in adoration, elevates the Sacred Host, and
kneels again. Then, in the same way, follows
the Consecration of the Chalice. We thus pay
our Lord a double adoration : first, under the
appearance of bread, and then under the appear
ance of wine in the chalice, and we remember
that this double Consecration was instituted by
Him as His mystical death, and as the renewal
of the pouring out of His Precious Blood.
The prayers that follow the Consecration are
most remarkable, and may be considered in a
particular way as the offering to God of the most
Holy Sacrifice. The Church says : " Calling
to mind the Passion, Resurrection, and Ascension
of our Lord, we offer unto Thy Most Excellent
Majesty of Thy gifts and grants, a pure Host,
a holy Host, an unspotted Host, the holy
Bread of eternal life and the Chalice of ever
lasting salvation." And, still mindful of the
ancient sacrifices of which the Holy Mass is
the fulfilment, the Church herself begs Almighty
God to accept it as " Thou wert pleased
graciously to accept the gifts of Thy just
154 The Treasure of the Church.
servant Abel, and the Sacrifice of our patriarch
Abraham, and that which Thy High Priest
Melchisedech offered to Thee, a holy sacrifice,
an immaculate Host.5'
And then we beg Almighty God " to command
these things to be carried by the hands of Thy
holy angel to the altar on high in the sight of
Thy Divine Majesty, that as many of us, who by
participation at this altar shall receive the most
Sacred Body and Blood of Thy Son, may be
filled with all heavenly benediction and grace."
In these prayers you may notice that the
priest makes the sign of the Cross over the
Blessed Sacrament repeatedly ; this he does not
as if blessing our Lord, but rather by way of
pointing out unmistakably that his words
apply to the very Host and Chalice before him,
and not to something in the abstract: "a pure
Host, a holy Host, an immaculate Host, the
holy Bread of eternal life, and the Chalice of
everlasting salvation." These crosses over the
Host and Chalice make the meaning of his words
particularly plain. This is the explanation ot
a great many of the crosses made during the
Mass. The Catholic Church does not admit of
any indefiniteness in such matters, and this is
one of her methods of making things clear.
It may also be said that although the Sacrifice
is really offered at the Consecration, the offering
is considered as continuing till the Communion,
and that these crosses are part of the ceremonial
by which it is offered.
The Treasure of the Church. 155
These prayers, then, we may call the " Solemn
Offering " of the Holy Sacrifice, since that made
at the " Oblation " is only an offering made by
anticipation of the Victim not yet on the altar.
We ask God to accept our Sacrifice as He did
that of Abraham ; not as if our Sacrifice could
possibly be unacceptable in itself, since He
always must be " heard for His reverence," but
because our dispositions in offering may be
exceedingly faulty, and we would gladly share
in the zeal and earnestness with which those
great Patriarchs made their offerings, and we
gladly remember that their offerings had their
value from that great Sacrifice we are now
actually renewing.
Next comes the " Memento for the Dead." It
looks as if the Church postponed all mention of
them till our Lord is actually on the altar, so as
to beg for our departed brethren "a place of
refreshment, light and peace," in the most
solemn and tender manner possible.
And now, that the whole Church may be
represented, comes the " Nobis quoque pecca-
toribus " — we beg that we poor sinners may have
some "part and fellowship with the holy
apostles and martyrs," and that God may admit
us into their company, " not considering our
merits, but freely pardoning our offences." It
will be observed that into this second list of
saints are introduced the names of those holy
women whose martyrdom threw such lustre on
the early Church : Felicitas, Perpetua, Lucy
156 The Treasure of the Church.
Agnes and others, as if they could not possibly
be omitted from the commemoration of the
whole Church, which in this Sacrifice presents
itself to the Eternal Father, " through Christ our
Lord : by whom, O Lord, Thou dost always
create, sanctify, quicken, bless and give to us all
those good things : through Him, and with Him,
and in Him, is to Thee, God the Father
Almighty, in the unity of the Holy Ghost, all
honour and glory, for ever and ever. Amen."
Then comes the " Pater Noster," which at
High Mass is sung by the priest, with a beauti
ful chant corresponding to that of the Preface.
The Church dwells on the last petition of the
Pater Noster and begs the Lord to " deliver us
from all evils, past, present, and to come, by the
intercession of the blessed and glorious Mary
ever Virgin Mother of God, and of the blessed
Apostles Peter and Paul and Andrew," and
" mercifully to grant peace in our days."
Then the priest breaks the Sacred Host and
puts part of it into the Chalice, saying : " May
this mixture and consecration of the Body and
Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ be to us who
receive it effectual to eternal life." This break
ing of the Host is the ceremony which specially
represents the Passion and death of our Lord
— " Thy Body was broken and Thy Blood was
spilt." It seems to call to our minds the last
scene of the Passion, when our Lord is hanging
on the Cross and His side is opened by the
spear : "It is consummated" (St. John xix. 30).
The Treasure of the Church. 157
" Truly this was the Son of God" (St. Matt,
xxvii. 54.)
And now comes the preparation for Com
munion. It begins with a direct personal
address to Our Lord on the altar. " Agnus
Dei" — " Lamb of God, who taketh away the
sins of the world, have mercy on us." This is
followed by three prayers : the first is for the
peace of the Catholic Church ; in the next, the
priest prays for the forgiveness of his sins :
" Deliver me by this Thy most Sacred Body and
Blood from all my iniquities and from all evils";
and in the third, he expresses that fear and
trembling with which all Christians must
approach to the Holy of Holies : u Let not the
participation, which I all unworthy, presume to
receive, turn to my judgment and condem
nation."
The first of these prayers begins with the
words, "Lord Jesus, who saidst to Thy apostles:
My peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto
you " (St. John xiv. 27). At the end of the prayer
the celebrant gives the " Pax " to the deacon, and
by him it is given to all the clergy assisting :
this " kiss of peace " refers to that special office
of the Blessed Sacrament, that of communion or
bond of union amongst all Christians, of which
the "Pax" is the symbol.
The last prayers, with the " Domine, non sum
dignus," are the priest's own special preparation
for Holy Communion. After repeating the
" Domine, non sum dignus," three times, he
158 The Treasure of the Church.
receives the Sacred Host, with the words, " May
the body of our Lord Jesus Christ preserve my
soul to life everlasting," and then the Chalice,
with the corresponding words. The priest's
communion under both kinds is necessary for the
completion of the Sacrifice ; so much so, that if the
celebrant were unable, from sickness, to receive,
another priest, if possible, must be called in to
receive, so that the Sacrifice may not be left
uncompleted.
The concluding prayers of the Mass are very
short, as if the Church wished to leave the priest
an opportunity of making his private thanks
giving. After the two ablutions, with their most
appropriate prayers, comes the " Communion,"
that is, a few verses of Scripture, and then the
" Post Communion," the prayers corresponding
with the Collects and the Secrets.
The Mass finishes with the " Ite, Missa est,"
or dismissal of the congregation, u the Blessing,"
and the*' last Gospel." This generally is taken
from the first chapter of St. John, concluding
with the words, "Et Verbum caro factum est,"
although sometimes another Gospel has to be
read.
In giving this sketch of the Mass, I have not
attempted to dwell on all the prayers contained
in the Ordinary of the Mass ; I have only con
sidered some of the most striking ones, to show,
as it were, the Church's line of thought during
the sacrifice. Every one of the prayers, how
ever, is well worth study, and, indeed, most
The Treasure of the Church. 159
of them could be expanded into a long
meditation.
If you take a few of these prayers and dwell
on them, without attempting to keep up with the
priest, who naturally has to say every word, you
have an excellent method of hearing Mass.
All these prayers are so full of profound
signification, and yet so short and simple in
their form, that people never get tired of them.
A priest uses the same words nearly every day,
for perhaps forty or fifty years, and at the end, I
think, he appreciates them more, and finds in
them more food for thought than he did at the
beginning.
CHAPTER VII.
HOLY MASS (concluded). — DEVOTIONS TO THE
BLESSED SACRAMENT.
Externals of Holy Mass. — Money for Masses. — "Overloaded
Ceremonial" versus " Beautiful Simplicity." — Stone Altars.
— Sanctuary Lamp. — Candles. — Vestments. — Opinions of
Hugh Miller and of the Hottentots. — Prayers used by the
Priest while vesting1. — Devotions. — Benediction. — Exposi
tions. — Forty Hours. — Visits. — Confraternity and Altar
Societies. — Holy Viaticum and Last Sacraments.
IN the last chapter I treated of the Sacrifice of
the Mass, and dwelt at some length on the
prayers and ceremonial used in the Western
Church. We must remember, however, that
there are many other liturgies in which different
rites, ceremonies, and prayers are used in the
sacrifice, which are, no doubt, better suited to
the countries in which they are used. I propose
now to speak of certain other points connected
with the Mass, and, in general, with the devotion
shown to the Blessed Sacrament.
I must first return to a subject I have already
mentioned, which needs a few words more,
because it is the occasion of a great deal of
The Treasure of the Church. 161
misunderstanding to people outside the Church.
I mean the practice of paying money for Masses.
If you go to a priest and pay him five shillings
to say Mass for you, is it not very like simony —
like thinking " that the gift of God may be
purchased with money " ? (Acts viii. 20).
The explanation is very obvious. It neces
sarily follows from the goodness of God in
allowing Mass to be offered not only for the
Church generally, but also for the wants and
necessities of individuals. In the Old Law,
God allowed and directed sacrifices to be offered
for private ends, and He has continued this
privilege in the New Law. The question is,
How can this privilege be exercised ? It would,
I think, be clearly impossible to suppose that
each one had a right to have as many Masses
said for him as he wished. Could it be imagined,
for instance, that anyone had a right to go to a
priest and say: " Be good enough to offer up
twenty Masses for the repose of the souls of my
parents — or for certain objects which I much
desire " ? If the priests were bound to say Mass
for everyone who asked, and as often as they
wished, it would be an intolerable burden. If,
on the other handr it were to be a matter of per
sonal favour, I think it would very largely
prevent people from having Masses said at all.
Men are generally too shy and diffident to ask
very often for personal favours of this sort.
If, then, our Lord's design is to be carried
out, the Church must interfere. She does so by
12
1 62 Ttie Treasure of the Church.
saying: "If you wish to have Mass said for
you, you must pay a certain sum of money,
which I hereby fix." This sum of money is
supposed to be the amount which would suffice
for the maintenance of the priest during the day.
St. Paul says: "They that serve the altar,
partake with the altar " (i Cor. ix. 13). And it
is reasonable for the Church to ordain that those
for whom the sacrifice of the day is offered should
provide the priest's maintenance for that day.
The sum appointed is, however, generally
speaking, far from sufficient. In England the
Provincial Synod has fixed the offering for a
Mass at five shillings, which is exceptionally
high. It is felt, however, to be more than the
poorer people can reasonably give, and I think
it is the custom to say Mass for them for two
shillings and sixpence. It very seldom happens
that priests receive these offerings every day, so
that there are very few cases in which a priest
could even live on what he receives for cele
brating. If one received five shillings for Mass
every day in the year, it would only amount to
£QI a year — on which it would be very difficult
for a priest to live in the decencies of his state.
To obtain this stipend a priest must celebrate
every day throughout the year, without making
any allowance for sickness, or for necessary rest,
or the many accidents which occasionally make
it difficult or impossible to say Mass.
On the other hand, che Church imposes a
heavy burden on the priest. If he accepts the
The Treasure of the Church. 163
offering, he is bound, under pain of grievous
sin, to celebrate, and to celebrate in reasonable
time. There are, moreover, many stringent
rules made by the Church to prevent the possi
bility of any " trafficking " in holy things, so
that a priest undertaking to say a considerable
number of Masses takes upon himself a very
heavy and burdensome responsibility. For
example, I think few priests would like to accept
;£ioo, with the obligation of saying the corre
sponding number of Masses. Of course, if the
priest could divide the money — and the obliga
tion — with fifteen or twenty other priests, it
would be a great boon ; but if he had to say
them all himself, and continuously, I think he
would have great hesitation in accepting the
burden.
Another point has to be considered. Those
who wish to have Mass celebrated for themselves
and for their special objects think that they
ought to give something themselves. It is a
very natural feeling that a sacrifice for them
ought to involve their giving something of their
own ; and if the whole burden of the offering is
left to someone else, they do not expect very
much advantage for themselves. Priests are
generally very willing to say Mass gratuitously
for the poor : that is, if they are able to do so
without interfering with the obligations they
have taken on themselves ; but, as I have said,
the poor generally prefer to pay what the Church
directs.
164 The Treasure of the Church.
In the Old Law, when individuals wished to
have sacrifice offered, it was for them to provide
the material for sacrifice — the lamb, the turtle
doves, or whatever else the law commanded to
be sacrificed : they did not expect the priests to
provide the things. The principle is much the
same, and, as a matter of fact, people are not
satisfied with having Mass said for them unless
they themselves have contributed something.
However, I come back to the point from which
I started, and say that the privilege of having
Mass offered would practically become a dead
letter without some such provision, and that it
was obviously the duty of the Church to make
regulations such as she has made, and that it is
our duty cordially to acquiesce in her ruling.
Another point on which I have now to dwell
is the ceremonial used by the Church in the
service of the Blessed Sacrament. Some people
are much struck — scandalised, perhaps — by the
outward display to be seen in Catholic churches.
You sometimes hear them talk of " overloaded
ceremonial," or, perhaps, if they are not quite
so civil, of " superstitious mummeries." In
fact, nearly the whole of the Catholic ceremonial
depends on the Real Presence of our Lord in
the Holy Eucharist. Some kind of ritual is
necessary whenever men meet for any kind of
public devotion. Even those who most disclaim
against ritual have ritual observances of their
own, and are most particular in observing
them.
The Treasure of the Church. 165
But when you get beyond this meagre cere
monial, and you have splendid churches and
gorgeously-ornamented altars, you have a cere
monial which means a great deal more. It must
represent some special presence of God, or it
would be unmeaning. The moment you believe
in the real, actual Presence of God on earth,
you have an ample justification for every orna
ment and every beauty you can collect together.
You have a splendid church on which the wealth
and skill of generations, perhaps, have been
lavished. If it has been built as the House of
God on earth, this is perfectly intelligible ; but
what can be more absurd than an elaborate and
costly meeting-house? Make it comfortable by
all means ; let it be well warmed and well lighted,
but splendid decorations are quite without
meaning.
The very fabric of the church suggests the
presence of God, and the adornment of the altar
carries out the same idea. In principle it is very
like the splendour and ceremonial of a king's
court. It is impossible for men to have royalty
amongst them, and yet not have some external
sign by which the king is pointed out and
honoured. The ceremonial has, of course,
differed widely at different times, but from the
earliest king that ever ruled amongst men down
to our own time, there has always been a royal
display of some kind. It is impossible, in the
same way, for men to believe that our Lord is
amongst them and not to lavish on Him their
i66 The Treasure of the Church.
most precious treasures, just as it was impossible
for St. Mary Magdalen not to pour out her
precious ointment on His feet (St. John
xii. 3).
The church is His palace, and the altar is His
throne. We take that glorious Court of Heaven
described to us in Holy Scripture, and try feebly
to imitate it on earth. The candles, and the
incense, and the flowers — the vestments and the
ceremonial of the priests — what are they but an
earthly image of that " great multitude which
no man could number . . . clothed with
white robes, and palms in their hands,"
and of "all the angels who stood about the
throne, and the ancients and the four living
creatures, and they fell down before the throne
upon their faces and adored God " ? (Apoc.
vii. 9-11).
Protestants are fond of talking of the " beau
tiful simplicity " of their services. If they
believe in no special Divine Presence in their
churches, they are quite right. If there is
nothing there to honour which is not found
everywhere else, they are quite consistent in
showing no marks of honour ; if, however, they
do believe that their church is the House of
God, why are they to be admired for their
simplicity?
Men spend large sums of money in decora
tions, illuminations, soldiers and artillery, to
celebrate the coming of the King ; and they
are right : but why not adopt the same principles
The Treasure of the Church. 167
in showing honour to the Presence of our Lord,
King of Kings ? *
But let us describe a little more in detail
the ceremonial surrounding the Blessed Sacra
ment. The altar must be of stone, perhaps to
commemorate the tombs of the martyrs in the
catacombs, which were the first altars on which
the Holy Eucharist was offered. On the feast
of the consecration of the Basilica of SS. Peter
and Paul at Rome, the Breviary says : " This
church was hallowed by holy Pope Silvester
upon the i8th day of November, in like manner
as he had hallowed the church of the Lateran
upon the gth day of the same month. In this
church did the Pope set up an altar of stone,
and pour ointment thereon, and ordain that
from henceforth no altars should be set up save
of stone " (5/A lesson).
It is interesting to notice that there is orie
exception to this rule, the account of which is
given in the following words: "The Blessed
Silvester afterwards decreed, when he was con
secrating the altar of the Prince of the Apostles,
that altars were henceforth to be made of stone
only ; but, notwithstanding this, the Lateran
cathedral had the altar made of wood. This is
not surprising. From St. Peter to Silvester,
the Popes had not been able, by reason of
persecutions, to abide fixedly in one place, and
* See Appendix " On the Use of Ritual," Credentials of
the Catholic Church, by Canon Bagshawe.
1 68 The Treasure of the Church.
they celebrated the Holy Liturgy in cellars,
burying places, in the houses of godly persons,
or wherever need drove them, upon a wooden
altar made like an empty box. When peace
was given to the Church, holy Silvester took
this, and to do honour to the Prince of the
Apostles, who is said to have offered sacrifice
thereon, and to the other Popes who thereon
had been used to celebrate the mystery even
unto that time, set it in the first church, even
the Lateran, and ordained that no one but the
Bishop of Rome should celebrate the Liturgy
thereon, for all time coming " (6th lesson,
Dedic. of St. Saviour's).
When we say the altar must be of stone, it
does not mean that the whole altar is necessarily of
stone, but that there should be at least a conse
crated stone under the middle of the altar, where
the Blessed Sacrament is placed. This stone
must be consecrated by the Bishop, and must
contain relics of the martyrs. When a priest is
starting for a missionary journey, he has to
carry with him an altar-stone of this kind.
The most striking thing in the adornment of
a Catholic altar is the number of lights burning
around it. There must always be a lamp
burning before the Blessed Sacrament, as an
indication that our Lord is there, just, we may
say, as sentries are placed before the King's
palace. When Mass is celebrated, or even if it
is necessary to open the tabernacle for a moment,
two candles are lighted on the altar. These
The Treasure of the Church. 169
candles are necessary for the celebration of the
Mass, so that even missionaries in far countries
cannot say Mass without them. When we say
" necessary," we do not mean that these things
are of the slightest importance in themselves,
but only that the Church always insists on them
out of reverence to the Holy Sacrament. At
High Mass six candles are lighted, three on
each side of the crucifix, which is always on the
altar. On other occasions — as at Benedictions
and Expositions — there is generally a profusion
of candles lighted.
Why all this expenditure? We have the
example of the Old Testament to begin with :
"Thou shalt make also seven lamps, and shalt
set them upon the candlestick, to give light over
against" (Exod. xxv. 37). If God commands
that His tabernacle in the Old Law should so be
honoured, naturally the Church pays a similar
honour to our Lord's Presence. Again, what
is our altar on earth but the image of the altar
on high ? We may, if we like, fancy that, like
the Patriarch, we can see "a ladder standing
upon the earth, and the top thereof touching
heaven : the angels also of God ascending and
descending by it " (Gen. xxviii. 12). Yes,
from our altar upon earth there is a perpetual
communication with that altar on high, which
is before the throne of God. " Command these
things to be carried by the hands of Thy holy
angel to Thy altar on high, in the sight of Thy
Divine Majesty." What is more reasonable than
i yo The Treasure of the Church.
that we should try to make our altar a poor
representation of that heavenly altar, and should
surround it with lights to represent the glorious
armies of shining angels around God's throne,
and that we should get everything precious
which we can gather together upon earth, in
place of the splendours of the heavenly Jeru
salem ? The Apostle speaks of Him "Who
holdeth the seven stars in His right hand, who
walketh in the midst of the seven golden candle
sticks " (Apoc. ii. i). May we not, then, sur
round our Lord with the best we can find on
earth to take the place of these golden candle
sticks of which we read ?
Again, we may say that we like to have
something consumed — wasted, if you please-
before Him. Men may cry out, as they did
when St. Mary Magdalen poured out her oint
ment : " Why this waste"? But our Lord did
not consider it waste. He said : " She hath
wrought a good work upon me " (St. Mark xiv.
4-6).
And now consider the vestments in which the
priest must be clad before he goes up to the
altar. Here, again, we have the example of
the Jews to guide us. Before he could presume
to offer sacrifice or enter into the Holy of Holies,
the Jewish priest must assume that most won
derful and emblematic garb appointed by God
Himself. We, too, have our awful Presence
and great Sacrifice, and it would be indeed
strange if we had no corresponding vesture.
The Treasure of the Church. 171
Protestants, however, when they come into
our churches sometimes talk about " overloaded
ceremonial," or, as Hugh Miller calls our sacred
rites, " theatric solemnities." He felt, as he tells
us, that " the stoled priest of the cathedral was
merely an artist, though a skilful one."
It does not seem to occur to these good people
that we are doing precisely what they do them
selves. When they go to an earthly court — to
attend the King's Drawing Room, for instance —
they take care to array themselves in the costume
prescribed by regulation and custom. Nay, in
social intercourse amongst themselves, they
never fail to dress themselves in regulation
garments. But our ecclesiastical vestments are
so " theatrical," so much out of date. They do
not remember that, by those who use them,
these vestments have been held sacred and
venerable from childhood, and are most closely
bound up with all the solemn and tender asso
ciation of their hearts. They are not new things,
but have been dear to the hearts of Christians
for untold centuries. The sentiments of some of
our Protestant friends about our solemnities and
vestments are a little like those of a Hottentot,
newly introduced to the ways of civilization.
" What tiresome ceremonial, what inconvenient
costume, what theatric manners," he would say
when first he saw the usages of modern life,
and such an idea would be natural enough to a
savage who had hitherto been clothed in a
blanket. You would expect educated people,
172 The Treasure of the Church.
however, to have more reflection and less
prejudice, and to remember that things are not
ridiculous because they themselves are not
accustomed to them.
These vestments come, in fact, from the earliest
days of the Church. The Mass was naturally
celebrated in the costliest and most solemn dress
then in use, and the garments once used for the
Sacrifice were naturally considered sacred, and
kept for these solemnities only. In this manner
the priestly vestments have been preserved in
the same pattern, with slight modifications,
through all these ages. Antiquaries could tell
you exactly the Roman dress from which each
of our vestments had its origin.
The special vestment for Mass is the chasuble,
without which it is unlawful to celebrate ; and
the vestment which a priest uses for all priestly
functions is the stole. If he has to administer
any sacrament, or to perform any ministration
about the Holy Eucharist, he puts the stole
around his neck as a symbol of his office.
When vesting for Mass, the priest first puts
on the " amice " — a cloth covering the head but let
down to the neck — with the prayer: " Place on
my head the helmet of salvation, that I may be
able to resist the attacks of the devil ; " then the
"alb" — the long white linen vestment — with the
words, " Make me white, O Lord, and cleanse
my heart, that, made white with the Blood of the
Lamb, I may attain to eternal joys ; " then he
puts on the " girdle," saying : " Gird me, O Lord,
The Treasure of the Church. 173
with the girdle of purity, and extinguish within
me the passion of lust, that the spirit of con
tinence and chastity may always remain within
me." Above these are the more distinctively
sacred vestments — the " maniple/' the " stole,"
and the " chasuble " — each with its own prayer.
For the maniple, which he places on his left arm,
he says : " May I be worthy, O Lord, to bear the
maniple of weeping and sorrow, that, with joy,
I may receive the reward of labour." He puts
the stole around his neck, crossing the ends over
his breast, saying : " Restore to me, O Lord, the
garment of immortality, which I lost by the sin
of my first parents, that, though I approach
unworthily to thy Sacred Mystery, I may merit
eternal joy." Over all he puts on the chasuble
saying : " Lord, who hast said my yoke is sweet
and my burden light, make me so to bear it as
to obtain thy grace."
These prayers give us a good idea of the
meaning of the vestments, and are admirably
calculated to remind the priest that he is going
up to the altar, not in his own person, but as the
representative of our Lord, who is the true
High Priest, u ever living to make intercession
for us."
I must now say a few words on some of the
other devotions to the Blessed Sacrament. The
commonest of these is " Benediction," which is
given in most churches two or three times every
week, and sometimes — as generally in the month
of October — almost every day.
174 The Treasure of the Church.
Cardinal Newman, in his sixth lecture on the
" Present Position of Catholics," gives a beau
tiful account of Benediction. "I need hardly
observe," he says, " that the Benediction of the
Blessed Sacrament is one of the simplest rites
of the Church. The priests enter and kneel
down ; one of them unlocks the tabernacle,
takes out the Blessed Sacrament, inserts it
upright in a monstrance of precious metal, and
sets it in a conspicuous place above the altar,
in the midst of the lights, for all to see. The
people then begin to sing ; meanwhile the
priest twice offers incense to the King of Heaven,
before whom he is kneeling. Then he takes the
monstrance in his hands, and, turning to the
people, blesses them with the Most Holy, in the
form of a cross, while the bell is sounded by one
of the attendants to call attention to the ceremony.
It is our Lord's solemn benediction of His people,
as when He lifted up His hands over the children,
or when He blessed His chosen ones when He
ascended up from Mount Olivet. As sons might
come before a parent before going to bed at
night, so, once or twice a week, the great
Catholic family comes before the Eternal Father,
after the bustle or the toil of the day, and He
smiles upon them, and sheds upon them the light
of His countenance. It is a full accomplishment
of what the priest invoked upon the Israelites :
' The Lord bless thee and keep thee ; the Lord
show His face to thee, and have mercy on thee ;
the Lord turn His countenance to thee and give
The Treasure of the Church. 175
thee peace.' Can there be a more touching rite,
even in the judgment of those who do not believe
in it? How many a man, not a Catholic, is
moved on seeing it to say, ' Oh, that I did
but believe it ! ' when he sees the priest take
up the Fount of Mercy, and the people bend low
in adoration. It is one of the most beautiful,
natural, and soothing actions of the Church."*
Benediction always begins with the hymn,
" O Salutaris Hostia "— " O Saving Host, which
openest the gates of Heaven." Then come
different devotions : sometimes the Rosary,
sometimes the Litany of the Blessed Virgin, or
any devotional pieces according to convenience ;
but it always finishes with the solemn hymn,
" Tantum ergo "•
" To this mysterious table now
Our knees, our thoughts, our hearts we bow "-
which is the special hymn of the Blessed Sacra
ment. Immediately after the "Tantum .ergo"
the Solemn Benediction is given to the people,
and the rite closes.
It may seem strange to some people that on
such an occasion we should so often make use of
devotions addressed to our Blessed Lady. * * Why
are not all your devotions poured forth directly
to our Lord, when He is actually present?"
This practice, it must be confessed, comes
partly from this : that in this country we have
not a very good supply of suitable devotions
* Present Position of Catholics, jrd Edition, p. 235.
176 The Treasure of the Church.
which are sufficiently well known to the people,
and which can conveniently be sung by a con
gregation. Some congregations know one
hymn, and are familiar with one devotion ; some
have other hymns and other devotions. There
are, unfortunately, many versions of most of the
popular prayers, which makes it difficult to use
them in public. The Rosary and the Litany oi
the Blessed Virgin, however, are beautiful
devotions for the presence of the Blessed Sacra
ment.
The Rosary is a series of meditations on the
life and Passion of Christ. What can we do
better before our Lord than lovingly recapitulate
the scenes of His life, the joys of Bethlehem,
His agonies in the garden and on the cross,
the glories of His resurrection and ascension?
We look up to the Blessed Sacrament and say
again and again, " Blessed is the fruit of thy
womb, Jesus." In the same way, most of the
invocations in the Litany have an immediate
reference to our Lord. For instance, we call
our Lady the " Ark of the Covenant " — contain
ing, not the tables of the law, but the Law-giver
Himself ; not the sign of God's covenant with
one people, but of His eternal covenant with
His fallen creatures. We call her the " Gate of
Heaven " - the portal through which the Creator
of all things came down into His own creation.
"He hath set His tabernacle in the sun, and
He as a bridegroom coming out of His bride
chamber, hath rejoiced as a giant to run the
The Treasure of the Church. 177
way" (Ps. xviii. 6). In the same way, most
of the invocations have reference to our Lord,
and are suitable for devotion before the Blessed
Sacrament ; though it would carry me too far
from my subject to dwell on them here.*
Besides Benediction, it is customary to have
many " Expositions " of the Blessed Sacrament.
This means that the altar is lighted up, and the
Blessed Sacrament is lifted up to that conspicu
ous place above the altar, which is called the
"Throne." There it remains for many hours,
or days, and the church is open during that time
for the people to come and worship. There may
be public prayers before our Lord during the
time, but the special idea of the devotion is
private prayer — that each one should come by
himself before our Lord and present his peti
tions. It is the custom during exposition to
have watchers ; that is, to have a number of
adorers coming in succession to a particular
kneeling-place, to be like a guard of honour
before an earthly sovereign, and to prevent the
Blessed Sacrament from ever being unattended.
These expositions are often appointed on occa
sions of joy or of sorrow, of danger or deliver
ance. Is some danger near — has some great
victory been obtained — the first idea of the
Church is to call all her children into the pre
sence of our Lord to present to Him their
thanks or their petitions — to make their acknow-
See Rosary Meditations, by Canon Bag-shawe.
'3
178 The Treasure of the Church.
ledgments to their Sacramental King, or to
implore His protection.
The most common of all these expositions is
the " Forty Hours," or " Quarant' Ore." In and
about London the Exposition of the Blessed
Sacrament is almost continuous from Septua-
gesima Sunday till Holy Week. The " Forty
Hours" begins in one church on Sunday morn
ing with a High Mass, the Litany of the Saints,
and a Procession of the Blessed Sacrament, and
is continued till Tuesday morning, when it con
cludes with another High Mass, called the Mass
of Deposition ; and a procession and the Litany
are repeated. Another church then begins its
forty hours' adoration, and so one church suc
ceeds to another during the whole of Lent. It
must be said, however, that in very many
churches it is not considered possible or expe
dient to keep the Blessed Sacrament exposed
during the night — which was the original idea —
so that the time of exposition falls considerably
short of forty hours. Moreover, most churches
find it necessary to begin their Exposition on
Sunday, for the convenience of their congrega
tions, so that during the greater part of the
week the adoration is going on only in one or
two large churches ; whereas on Sundays the
Exposition is probably beginning in a dozen
different churches, which rather spoils the idea
of perpetual adoration.
Besides all these forms of devotion, there is
what may be considered the most beautiful and
The Treasure of the Church. 179
profitable of all. Our Lord, on one occasion,
said to His Apostles, " Come with Me into the
desert and rest awhile" (St. Mark vi. 31). He
seems, in the Blessed Sacrament, to address us in
the same manner. The church is left open all day,
and from morning till night you may find in
the great silent gloom numbers of worshippers
just come in from the hurry and business of life
to pay their few minutes' adoration before our
Lord, alone with Him — needing no ceremonial
or priestly ministration, but just worshipping
face to face. " The Lord is nigh. Be nothing
solicitous, but in everything by prayer and
supplication with thanksgiving let your petitions
be made known to God " (Phil. iv. 5-6).
Spiritual writers lay great stress on this prac
tice of " visiting the Blessed Sacrament," and
many books of suitable prayer have been pub
lished ; but on such occasions, and in such a
presence, our own words are best ; and if we are
full, as we ought to be, of tender devotion to
our Lord in the Holy Sacrament, we shall never
want words, for "out of the abundance of the
heart the mouth speaketh " (St. Mark xii. 34).
In most churches there is to be found a Con
fraternity of the Blessed Sacrament — indeed, this
confraternity ought to be erected before any
other. The object of this confraternity is to
provide ornaments for the special altar of the
Blessed Sacrament — to find suitable candles and
flowers, and, as far as their means go, to get
everything precious which can be offered to our
180 The Treasure of the Church.
Lord. Still more is it their business to give
personal service : to visit our Lord in the taber
nacle, to watch before Him on solemn occasions,
to go with Him on processions, when He is
carried solemnly amongst His people, and to
pay Him reverence on all occasions.
I have only one thing more to mention con
nected with the Blessed Sacrament : that is, the
Holy Viaticum. This is the name, as I have
already said, which is given to Holy Communion
when it is received by the sick. Those who are
in danger of death are bound to receive Holy
Communion, and the Church's law of fasting
does not apply to them. By danger of death,
we do not mean necessarily immediate danger,
so that it is very wrong to postpone the Viaticum
till the sick man is in his last extremity. If
people do this they are very likely not to receive
it at all, or not to receive until they are almost
unable to appreciate what they are doing. The
Holy Viaticum is one of the " last rites " of the
Church, and a good Christian ought to be most
anxious to receive these the moment it is clear
that there is a real serious danger of death.
The last rites of the Church are : Penance — the
last confession a man is likely to make before
he presents himself before his Creator ; the
Viaticum, in which our Lord offers Himself as
food to strengthen him in his last journey ; and,
finally, Extreme Unction. This last sacrament
is the special sacrament of the dying, and may
be given even to those who have lost con-
The Treasure of the Church. 181
sciousness. St. James says : " Is any man sick
among you? Let him bring in the priests of the
Church, and let them pray over him, anointing
him with oil in the name of the Lord. And the
prayer of faith shall save the sick man : and the
Lord shall raise him up, and if he be in sins,
they shall be forgiven him " (St. James v.
i4-J5)-
The special office of this sacrament is to
cleanse the sick man from all the remaining
stains of sin, especially those committed by any
of the senses. The organs of the senses are
anointed with the holy oil, with the words : " By
this holy anointing and His own most tender
mercy, may God forgive you all the sins you
have committed by any of your senses." This
sacrament has been in use in the Church of
God, as the special sacrament of the dying,
ever since the time of the apostles.
When you have received the last sacraments,
the priest is empowered to give you the special
plenary indulgence which is granted by the
Pope to those in danger of death. Foolish
people seem to think that when they have
received the last sacraments, they must die — or,
at any rate, are more likely to die than before—
whereas all experience shows that those who
receive these rites of the Church in good time,
are not only able to receive them more profit
ably, but very often recover their health in an
unexpected way: " The Lord shall raise him
up."
1 82 The Treasure of the Church.
To come back, however, to the Viaticum.
There is something specially beautiful in this
last visit which our Lord in His Sacramental
Presence pays to His poor and suffering mem
bers on earth. In Catholic countries the Blessed
Sacrament is carried through the streets with
lights before it, and the moment the bell is
heard announcing His Presence, everyone stops
and kneels down till the Lord has passed. In
the sick man's room a little altar is put up, with
candles and flowers, with a crucifix and holy
water, that the priest may find a suitable place
on which our Lord may rest. " Pax huic domui
et omnibus habitantibus in ea." " Peace be to
this house and all who dwell therein " : with these
words the priest sprinkles the room and the
people present. Then comes the public con
fession made in the sick man's name, and the
priest communicates to him the Body of the
Lord, with the words: " Receive, brother, the
Viaticum of the Body of our Lord Jesus Christ
to preserve you from your malignant enemy and
to lead you into life everlasting." I might here
say a few words about the Holy Oil, the blessed
candles, the holy water and other things of this
sort which the Church uses, but they hardly
belong to my subject. These things are called
" Sacramentals," or things having an analogy
with the sacraments ; and it is enough to say
that they are ways in which the efficacy of the
Church's solemn prayers are communicated to
those who use them devoutly.
The Treasure of the Church. 183
I cannot conclude what I have to say about
the Blessed Sacrament better than by this con
sideration of the Holy Viaticum. What can be
more touching than to consider that our Lord
has so ordained that His Sacred Body shall be
carried to all the sick indiscriminately, rich and
poor, saints and sinners — our Lord would visit
them all? " The Lord help him on his bed of
sorrow : thou hast turned all his couch in his
sickness " (Ps. xl. 4).
To each and all our Lord would come, as the
Pastor to his flock, to bring to each the inesti
mable blessing of His Divine Presence, and
nourishment of that food of immortality, which,
as He Himself tells us, shall u raise us up at
the last day " (St. John vi. 55).
CHAPTER VIII.
PENANCE, THE SACRAMENT OF PURIFICATION.
Penance and Holy Eucharist intimately connected. — Words
of Institution plain. — Objectors and the Root of the
Question. — Their Experience. — Misconceptions. — A Secret
Court of Mercy. — The Duly Appointed Judge. — The Form
of the Sentence. — The Self-accused. — Contrition. — Its
Necessity, Nature, and accompanying-Conditions. — Sorrow
for Venial Sin. — Confession. — Why necessary. — What
to Tell and How to Tell it. — How Not to Make our Con
fession. — Satisfaction.
IN order to finish satisfactorily the subject I
have taken up, I must give some time to con
sidering the Sacrament of Penance. Penance
and the Holy Eucharist are very intimately
connected, and there is a marked difference
between them and the other Sacraments. All
the others are intended for special occasions
only — some can never be repeated — others from
their nature can only be received a few times in
the course of a man's life. Holy Eucharist and
Penance, however, are the Sacraments of daily
life : we need them from the dawn of reason till
The Treasure of the Church. 185
the day we die. To recur to a comparison I
have before used, they are like the pillar of
cloud, and the pillar of fire which accompanied
the Israelites in their journey through the desert.
These sacraments are the food and the medicine
of our souls, and therefore, in the nature of
things, must always be ready for use when
required.
There is another bond uniting the two
sacraments. We can hardly see how our Lord
could have left us His Body and Blood as our
food, without at the same time leaving us some
special means of purification. At His last
supper, before giving to them His Body and
Blood, our Lord said to His Apostles : " You
are clean by reason of the word which I have
spoken to you " (St. John xv. 3). We see, more
over, that when He was about to work a miracle,
He first forgave the offences of those on whom
He was to bestow His favours : " Be of good
heart, son, for thy sins are forgiven " (St. Matt. ix.
2). Such words we find again on similar occasions.
Is it to be supposed that He would grant the
immense favour of such an intimate union with
Himself, without providing for men some special
means of purification? When our Lord, at His
last supper, washed the feet of His apostles, and
then said to them: " You are clean, but not
all " (St. John xiii. 10), He seems to point in a
very striking way to the necessity of a special
purification before receiving the Holy Eucharist.
Our Lord established the Sacrament of
i86 The Treasure of the Church.
Penance in the plainest words which He could
have used. He says: "I will give thee the
keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatsoever
thou shalt bind on earth it shall be bound also in
heaven, and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth
it shall be loosed also in heaven " (St. Matt,
xvi. 19). He uses still more explicit words, in
which He shows in what that binding and
loosing was specially to consist, when, after His
Resurrection, He says : " Whose sins you shall
forgive they are forgiven, and whose sins you
shall retain they are retained " (St. John xx. 23).
If these words mean anything, they mean the
Sacrament of Penance. Here, however, we have
another illustration of the fact that no number of
texts is sufficient to convince men. No book
ever did, or ever will, teach men a religion.
The world was taught the Christian Religion, not
by the Holy Scriptures, but by the Apostles ; and
all the heresies were started, not by books, but
by men, who first went astray after their own
ideas and fancies, and then led others after
them. Their followers no doubt supposed that
they were guided by the Holy Scriptures, but, in
reality, followed the idea given by their founders,
and paid attention only to such texts as seemed
to support their views.
Those who do not accept the Sacrament of
Penance do not pretend to find any other
meaning for these solemn words of Christ — they
simply disregard them, professing all the while
to take Scripture as their guide.
The Treasure of the Church. 187
A very bitter controversy has risen about this
Sacrament, and perhaps more foolish and
spiteful things have been said about it than
about any other doctrine of the Catholic Church,
which is saying a great deal. The curious
thing in the controversy is that on one side are
all those who have accurate knowledge and long
experience of the question at issue, and on the
other side, those who, on their own showing,
have absolutely no knowledge or experience.
It would seem as if they considered crass
ignorance of a subject the best qualification for
discussing it.
I think I may venture here to quote a few
pages on this subject from a former book of my
own, " The Credentials of the Catholic Church."
I there say : " Hardly a day goes by without
our hearing some denunciation of the * Con
fessional.' Ignorant and excited people (and
very often, too, people whose education ought
to have taught them better) clamour about the
' presumption of men pretending to forgive
sins/ or about the 'horrors and impieties,'
'the dangers and abuses of the confessional.'
They never seem, by any chance, to get to the
root of the whole thing, which is a very plain
and simple question, namely : Has Almighty
God established the Sacrament of Penance,
including confession therein, as the ordinary
means for the pardon of sins? It is obvious that,
in reality, this is the only point to dispute about.
If it were established to their full satisfaction
i88 The Treasure of the Church.
that such was the case, I hope and believe that
the determined haters of the confessional would
at once crowd to confession themselves ; certainly
they would do so, if they are as honest as I
wish to believe them. On the other hand, we
Catholics are by no means so much attached to
the practice of confession that we should follow
it if we did not believe that God had instituted it
to pardon our sins.
" Moreover, all the alleged objections disappear
when once this point has been settled. You are
of opinion that it is injurious to morality ; but,
if you believe that God has appointed it, you
must be certain that, in the long run, it cannot
possibly be injurious, but must be beneficial. I
do not mean to say that it cannot possibly be
abused ; there is nothing in the world so holy,
or so clearly established by God, that it may not
be abused. The sacred name of father, the
position of religious teacher, the office of teacher
of youth, of temporal ruler, of protector of
the weak — all these things, though manifestly
appointed by God, have been again and again
abused. What then ? Does anyone imagine
that the abuses which have occurred in the
performance of sacred trusts such as these, even
if they had been much greater than they have
been, are at all to be compared with the obvious
advantages derived from them ? Just in the same
way, if once you believe the Confessional to
have been established by God, as the ordinary
way by which men's sins are forgiven, alleged
The Treasure of the Church. 189
abuses, though of course to be deplored, really
go for nothing as an argument.
" It is clear, moreover, that the fact of such a
conviction of itself, independently of its truth
goes a long way to neutralise any danger that
may exist. That is to say, the conviction that
God has appointed a certain means for a great
end, not only proves to us that it cannot really
be injurious, but of its own nature, to a great
extent at any rate, prevents it from being so. It
is very seldom that people are really put into
danger by doing what they honestly believe to
be necessary, and strictly their duty. In the
performance of their duty, people often have to
see things, and hear things, and do things,
which would be most dangerous and wrong if
they were done without any necessity. What
then ? Does anybody imagine that right-minded
people, honestly carrying out their duty, are
exposed to any extraordinary danger of sin, or
are at all more wicked than their neighbours?
Such an idea would be scouted by sensible men
in the ordinary affairs of life, and yet people
commonly take no account of these consider
ations when they come to talk of what they
are pleased to term the ' dangers of the
Confessional.'
" People, however, may be inclined to say,
* That is all very well ; but, in this instance,
the dangers and abuses are such that it is clear
God cannot have instituted the Confessional.'
Well, in the first place, it is not very safe to
190 The Treasure of the Church.
undertake to say what God can have done or
cannot have done. God's ways are not like our
ways — that we know ; and we know also, that
it is impossible, generally speaking, for man
to take a sufficiently extended view of such
questions to be able to decide upon them safely.
Such a saying, therefore, looks very presump
tuous. In the next place, who are the people
who make this assertion ? Now you come to the
odd, the remarkable, the strange part of the
business. The people who speak so positively
and energetically on the subject, are exactly the
people who have never been to confession in
their lives, and would rather die than do so.
They have probably never read a serious, or
even apparently reliable book on the subject,
and have no possible means of knowing how
the system works. On the other hand, there
are, in this country, hundreds and thousands of
people, of all ages and conditions, who have
been in the constant habit of confession from
their childhood upwards ; there are, besides,
hundreds who have entered the Church in the
prime of life. They then deliberately adopted
the practice of confession, and have persevered
many years. Why do not these people come
forward and tell us something of the dangers
and abuses of which we hear? Do they do so?
I never heard of one yet, unless he meant to
make a livelihood by lecturing. Not only have
they nothing to say, but, oddly enough, they
persevere in the practice themselves, and show
The Treasure of the Church. 191
great anxiety that their children should do so
likewise.
"If ever their young people neglect the practice
of confession, as unfortunately happens some
times, these good people imagine, not that they
have found confession injurious, and are there-
ore avoiding it, but that their young friends
have got careless about religion, and are going
wrong.
"The case, then, is this : Those who denounce
confession are those who, on their own showing,
know nothing about it ; whereas, those who
maintain it, clearly have every possible oppor
tunity of understanding the question. And yet
the public is entirely convinced by the clamour
of the first, and does not consider the evidence
of the second class worth hearing. If I were to
commence a course of lectures on seafaring
matters, and the dangers and vicissitudes of a
sailor's career, and I began by assuring my
audience that I had never been to sea in my
life, that I had never read any nautical books,
and scarcely ever spoken to a sailor, and that,
finally, I did not pretend to know stem from
stern, or one mast from another, I do not think
people would pay much attention to my remarks,
or care greatly about my opinion. How is it
that what common sense suggests in ordinary
matters, is just what people do not do in
religion ? " *
* Credentials of the Catholic Church , p. 82.
192 The Treasure of the Church.
Without saying more about this controversy,
I should like to deal with certain important mis
conceptions on the subject of the Sacrament of
Penance. First, it is spoken of by those who
have never tried it as a burden laid on the
sinner. If you look at it properly, it is just the
contrary. Let us remember our Lord's parable
of the Prodigal Son. When wearied out with
his iniquities, he says : " I will arise, and will go
to my father." What does his father do, when he
sees him afar off? Does he leave him to struggle
on as best he can without any assistance ? No.
" When he was yet a great way off, his father
saw him and was moved with compassion, and
running to him, fell upon his neck and kissed
him," and " said to his servants, bring forth
quickly the first robe, and put it on him " (St.
Luke xv. 1 8, 20, 22).
It is precisely for this purpose that our Lord
established the Sacrament of Penance. A sinner
moved to return to God, is not sufficient for
himself : he needs encouragement, direction,
assistance, and special graces. All these are
afforded to him in the sacrament by one author
ized to speak to him in the name of the Lord,
by one who may say with St. Paul : " For
Christ, therefore, we are ambassadors : God as
it were exhorting by us " (2 Cor. v. 20). But he
has not merely to exhort and direct ; he has to
communicate the special graces necessary for the
penitent, for which the sacrament was designed.
He is commanded and empowered, as were the
The Treasure of the Church. 193
servants in the parable, to " put on the first
robe," by restoring to him the forfeited garment
of sanctifying grace. Everyone with the slight
est experience knows how wonderfully these
great gifts and blessings are bestowed in the
Sacrament of Penance, and how wonderfully
they assist sinners returning to God. Is it not
marvellous that such an institution of Divine
tenderness should be spoken of as a heavy
burden laid on the sinner !
Another misconception is the idea that the
confessional is an instrument of slavery, by
which the priest becomes a despot over his
flock. This is not so. The sinner must indeed
confess his sins ; but he has unbounded liberty
to choose his own confessor. He can at any
moment leave one confessor, and betake himself
to another, and no one can call him to account
for his change. If the confidences had been
made, and the exhortations and good advice
been given in ordinary life, the sinner who
received them might, perhaps, consider that his
adviser had, afterwards, some kind of hold over
him. In sacramental confession, however, it is
not so. He knows that his confessor cannot in
the most distant manner allude to what has
passed between them, either publicly or pri
vately. Unless he chooses to return to the
same confessor, the penitent is perfectly certain
that nothing that he has said can be used in
any way as a means of exercising control over
him, and then only in the sacrament.
194 The Treasure of the Church.
Now to speak a little more in detail. The
common name of the Sacrament of Penance is
" Confession." It is, of course, strictly speaking,
an incorrect name, because the name which
properly belongs to only one part of the sacra
ment is used for the whole.
In the Sacrament of Penance, according to
our Lord's appointment, there are two parties—
the confessor and the penitent — and there are
certain things required from each of these
parties. If they both do what is necessary, we
are quite sure that our Lord will do His part,
and remit the sins of the penitent as He has
promised : " Whose sins you shall forgive, they
are forgiven." Our Lord, we know, never
forgets His promises.
The office of the priest is to grant Absolution ;
the duty of the penitent is to supply the needful
Contrition, Confession, and Satisfaction.
" Absolution " means the words of pardon.
Contrition is explained in the Catechism as "a
hearty sorrow for our sins, because by them we
have offended so good a God, together with a
firm purpose of amendment."
" Confession " is " to accuse ourselves of our
sins to a priest approved by the bishop, " and
"Satisfaction" is " doing the penance given us
by the priest."
Now, first, we have to observe that it has
pleased our Lord to make this sacrament a
court of justice. It seems as if He said to us :
" My children, I am the judge of the living and
The Treasure of the Church. 195
the dead. One day you must come before me
to be judged, and then my judgment will be
most searching and severe : a judgment of
justice, which you will find it very hard to meet.
I, therefore, establish a court of mercy here upon
earth, in which you may, if you will, forestall
my terrible judgment, whilst you have still time.
This tribunal is a secret one, in which you may
choose your own judge, and in which you
yourself shall be accuser and witness ; and, if
you will only bring to this judgment suitable
dispositions, I will promise to ratify the sentence
pronounced in your favour."
What a wonderful mercy is offered to sinners
in such an institution ! What a contrast ! How
awful will be that judgment when u every man's
work shall be manifest" (i Cor. iii. 13) — when
the clear light of God shall reveal the secrets of
every heart, and every man shall be judged
according to his works : when the time of mercy
is past, and the time for strict justice has come.
" Quid sum miser tune dicturus?"
"Unhappy me, what shall I say, and to what
patron shall I pray, when e'en the just might
quake with dread ? " ( Bp. Bagshawes translation
of the "Dies Ira").
How shall I meet that judgment, when even
the most holy have cause for fear? " Enter not
into judgment with Thy servant, for in Thy
sight no man shall be justified."
In place of this awful judgment our Lord
offers to us the most secret tribunal upon earth,
196 The Treasure of the Church.
before a judge weak and sinful as ourselves,
"who can have compassion on them that are
ignorant and that err : because he himself also
is compassed with infirmity " (Heb. v. 2). We
have to appear before a tribunal, the secrets of
which are about the most inviolable upon earth,
and whose judgments can never be used for any
earthly purpose. How can we sufficiently value
the privilege of being able to anticipate the
terrible judgment to come in so easy a way !
But since the sacrament is established as a
court, many things follow. The judge of this
court must be duly appointed — that is, must
have inherited the power given by our Lord to
His apostles, since such a power could come
from no other source. This, however, is not
sufficient : the judge must not only be a priest,
but a priest " approved " by the Bishop. " Ap
proved " is here used in quite a technical sense.
It does not mean that the bishop has a high idea
of the intelligence, learning, and good qualities
of the priest in question, but that he has given
him " faculties," or authority, to hear confessions
in his diocese. This authority can be obtained
only from the bishop of the diocese, or from the
Pope, who has authority over the whole Church ;
but, without it, no priest can hear confessions
even validly, still less lawfully. The Sacrament
of Penance requires both " Order" and " Juris
diction." Let me illustrate this. A man may
be a post-captain in His Majesty's navy, but he
has not, as such, authority over a single man.
The Treasure of the Church. 197
Let him be put in command of a ship, and then
his authority is full : before, it was only dor
mant. So it is with penance. A priest cannot
exercise the authority he received at his ordina
tion until he is put in spiritual authority over
some portion of the flock.
The spiritual court, moreover, must exercise
its power in the form of a sentence. This the
priest does by imposing a penance, or punish
ment, of some kind, and then by pronouncing
absolution. The penance, or punishment, is at
the present day a nominal thing — that is, only
some short prayer to recite, which is, in fact,
merely an admission that we deserve punish
ment, rather than a punishment in reality. In
the early Church it was not so. Penances were
then sometimes long and severe. We have, for
instance, all read how St. Ambrose, Archbishop
of Milan, met the Emperor Theodosius at the
church door, and refused him admission till he
had performed a long penance for an act of
cruelty he had committed.
The court of Penance differs, however, from
human courts in this, that its decisions are not
always effective, since they depend on the
internal dispositions of the culprit. Human
laws deal with external things, which can be
known to men ; but Divine law is concerned
Avith spiritual things, which men cannot see.
The sinner, then, can himself oppose obstacles
which will render void the merciful sentence
pronounced in his behalf. It is not that the
198 The Treasure of the Church.
court has not the power to pardon him— since
our Lord has given that power without restric
tion — but it is that he himself is incapable of
being forgiven. To use a common illustration :
if you attempt to light a fire when the fuel is
dripping with water, you cannot succeed. It is
not the fault of the fire you apply, but it is
because the fuel is incapable of burning so long
as it remains in that state.
This naturally leads to the conditions neces
sary on the part of the penitent. These are
contrition, confession, and satisfaction.
Of these, contrition is the most important.
We say this, because contrition is necessary in
two ways. It is necessary as a part of the
Sacrament of Penance — or, perhaps we had
better say, because, without it, penance would
be wholly ineffective. But it is necessary, in a
much more general sense, because without it,
no sin could ever be forgiven, either in the
present dispensation, or at any previous period.
The Sacrament of Penance is ordinarily neces
sary for the forgiveness of sins, because our
Lord has been pleased to appoint it for the pur
pose ; but contrition is necessary in the nature
of things, and it would hardly be too much to
say that Almighty God Himself cannot forgive
sins without it, since His doing so would be like
giving His approbation to sin.
Penance, as a sacrament, is necessary for
those who are able to make use of it ; but those
who cannot use it may sometimes dispense with
The Treasure of the Church. 199
it, whereas contrition is always necessary. If,
for instance, you were far away from a priest,
you might obtain the pardon of sin by contrition
alone — supposing you had a good will to comply
with our Lord's ordinance as soon as you were
able. What applies to physical impossibility,
applies also, to a great extent, to moral impossi
bility, and we may reasonably hope that those
who know nothing about penance as a sacrament
appointed by our Lord, may very well obtain
pardon for their sins by contrition only.
And now, what is this all-essential contrition ?
It is a sorrow for sin with certain conditions
annexed to it. First, it is called contrition from
the Latin word " contero " — to break. We are
all familiar with the expression " broken-hearted,"
and it is used to express a very sincere and deep
sorrow. This word is applied to sorrow for sin,
to show how real and deep it ought to be.
" Rend your hearts, and not your garments,
and be converted to the Lord your God "
(Joel ii. 12).
But you may apply the word contrition more
strictly, perhaps, to mean a breaking of the will.
The very idea of sin is man setting up his
obstinate and perverse will against the will of
God. It is essentially a rebellion, and, so long
as man perseveres in his rebellion, there can be
no peace. By contrition, this stubborn will of
man, and this rebellion against God, are broken
down, and the door for forgiveness is opened.
To have such a wonderful effect, contrition must
2oo The Treasure of the Church.
have certain special qualities. It must be the
highest kind of sorrow. You must grieve for
your sins above all things : " I beg pardon for
all my sins, and detest them above all things "
such are the terms found in one shape or another
in all acts of contrition. Contrition means the
highest kind of sorrow, but it does not neces
sarily mean the most sensible kind of sorrow.
You may, for instance, have a very sincere con
trition without much of that feeling of grief you
would have for the loss of a friend. It is a
matter rather of will than of feelings, and con
sists in turning away from sin, and turning back
to God with an earnest and energetic will.
Contrition is, as the Catechism tells us, a
sorrow for sins, " because by them we have
offended so good a God." This means that
contrition must have a supernatural motive ; in
other words, it must arise from the love and fear
of God. No human motive, however respect
able, is enough to obtain the pardon of sins.
Such human motives may, and often do, lead to
contrition, but they are not contrition. For
instance, a man may most sincerely grieve for
his crime because it has brought shame and
disgrace on his family, and greatly pained all
those whom he loves. Such a feeling might
easily lead him to a true contrition, but would
not be enough by itself.
For this reason true contrition must include
all mortal sins at least. If you were sorry for
one sin, and were not also sorry for another,
The Treasure of the Church. 201
which you knew had grievously offended God,
it plainly would not be the " offence of God,"
but some other motive, that caused your sorrow.
Contrition must, as I said before, be accom
panied by certain conditions. The first of these
is a readiness and determination to do everything
that the law of God imperatively requires at the
moment. A man has committed an injustice
against his neighbour : it is his imperative duty
to repair the injury if he can. If he will not do
this, he has not real contrition. A man is
harbouring rancorous feelings against his neigh
bour : in order to have true contrition he must
be willing to give up his resentment. A person
may be living in the immediate occasion of sin.
The law of God requires him to leave such an
occasion ; and if he is really sorry for his sin, he
will certainly do so.
In the same way contrition requires a purpose
for the future: "a resolution to avoid, by the
grace of God, not only sin, but also the danger
ous occasions of sin." It is hardly necessary to
point out how completely this answers the old
absurd calumny that Catholics could get absolu
tion for their sins in advance — that is, for sins
they intended to commit.
But can you not be very sorry for something
you have done, and yet be prepared to do it
again under certain circumstances ? Certainly
you can with some kinds of sorrow. You might
grieve most sincerely at having sacrificed your
most precious treasures to save you from ship-
2O2 The Treasure of the Church.
wreck ; and yet might be quite ready to do the
same again under similar circumstances. This,
however, does not apply to contrition, because
contrition is essentially the highest kind of
sorrow.
Our Lord says: " He that loveth father or
mother more than Me is not worthy of Me "
(St. Matt. x. 37). So that if one were prepared to
commit a sin, in any contingency whatever, or
for the sake of any creature whatever, he would
certainly not have contrition, and would be in
capable of pardon. That, however, does not
mean that we are bound to put before our minds
all possible painful contingencies that may occur,
and ask ourselves what we should do in the
circumstances. Such considerations are quite
unnecessary and inexpedient. It is sufficient
for us to be honestly and sincerely sorry for the
past, and to have a firm purpose to do all that
God requires of us in the future, humbly trusting
that His grace will help us to do it.
Our excellent Protestant friends seem to have
a very faulty notion of what we mean by con
trition, and appear to think that you can be
really penitent for a sin, although you are pre
pared to commit it again under certain circum
stances. For instance, "The Monk of St.
Mary's Aisle," as described by Sir Walter Scott,
was very energetic in his penance, but had no
purpose of amendment. With all his penance
for his share in the doings of the "Wizard
Michael Scott," he was quite ready to bring all
The Treasure of the Church. 203
the wizard's spells to light again " at his Chief
of Branksome's need." Obviously, he had no
idea of what contrition really meant.
I have said that at Confession it is absolutely
necessary to have a true sorrow for all mortal
sins, and a sincere determination not to commit
them again. Without this true contrition you
cannot obtain pardon. The question arises :
Are you bound to have a similar sorrow and
purpose of amendment for all venial sins ?
I ought to say that everyone who wishes to
make a good confession should do all he can to
make the best possible act of contrition — that is,
to repent of his sins on the highest possible
grounds, namely, for the love and fear of God,
and, as far as possible, to repent of every
thought, word, and deed by which he has
offended God. It is all very well for theologians
to make distinctions and to discuss the motives
and extent of contrition ; but, in practice, if you
do not try for the best contrition you can, you
are not likely to make a good confession.
To be accurate, however, you are not bound
to have contrition and purpose of amendment
for all venial sins.
This seems strange at first, and needs ex
planation. How can you be reconciled to God
if you mean to go on offending Him in little
things? Such is the question which naturally
suggests itself. The distinction seems to be this :
i. Mortal sin and the love of God mutually
exclude each other. No one can love God who
204 The Treasure of the Church.
is determined to do an act which he knows to be
inconsistent with the love of God, and a rebel
lion against Him. He must choose between the
Creator and the creature. Venial sin, however,
does not exclude the love of God. In our pre
sent state, a man may love God, even if he has
an unreasonable attachment to creatures, and
has not the courage to free himself from the
faults into which this attachment leads him.
2. To put the same thing in a slightly different
way : by a good confession we put on the " first
robe" of charity — the wedding garment of
sanctifying grace. This, if received at all, must
necessarily forgive all grievous sins which are
incompatible with the love of God, but need not
forgive all smaller offences. If you have not
sufficient sorrow for them, they cannot be for
given, and they impede the action of sanctifying
grace, although they do not prevent it alto
gether.
3. If a true sorrow for all venial sins were
necessary, it would follow that no one could
receive pardon for his sins unless he was pre
pared to become a saint — which is a state of
mind very much beyond the reach of ordinary
Christians, however desirable it may be.
4. The subject matter of venial sin makes it
practically impossible for ordinary people to
have any great contrition and purpose of amend
ment. They are, as we have said, things which
do not strike our consciences as serious matters.
They are generally sins of weakness : we may
The Treasure of the Church. 205
deplore our weakness, carelessness, and want of
thought, but it is difficult to have any very
strong feeling about each display of these feel
ings. How can we grieve deeply over slight
negligences, irritable tempers, small displays of
vanity ? We know they are wrong and foolish,
and if we were saints we should feel them deeply ;
as it is, we cannot.
There are, however, some venial sins which
have more point and purpose and deliberation ;
for these we can, and ought to have a distinct
contrition and purpose of amendment, though it
we honestly believe them to be unimportant
things, this disposition is not, strictly speaking,
required.
Now comes confession. We must " accuse
ourselves to a priest " — but why ? It may be
objected that our Lord says nothing about con
fessing our sins. The plain answer to this is
that this duty of confession is contained in the
power granted by Him to His apostles : " Whose
sins you shall forgive they are forgiven, and
whose sins you shall retain they are retained."
These words evidently imply the commission to
act as judges. It would, I think, be absurd to
suppose that such a power was to be used at
random, and therefore they confer on the apostles
authority to act as judges. If the King sends
judges out into the land, the very commission to
judge gives them a right to hear the cases, and
implies an obligation to do so even if such a
power had not been granted in express terms.
206 The Treasure of the Church.
No one can possibly form a judgment about
our sins except by our own testimony ; therefore
we must be our own accusers, and the only
witnesses against ourselves.
The first requisite of a confession is " in
tegrity " — that is, that nothing should be kept
back that ought to be told. Integrity, however,
is of two sorts — " material " integrity and " for
mal" integrity. The first is when all is actually
mentioned ; the second, when all is mentioned
that occurs to the mind of the penitent — that is,
when he honestly mentions his sins as far as he
knows them and circumstances will allow. It is
the formal integrity which is necessary, so that
no number of unintentional omissions would
interfere with the validity of a confession.
Obviously, the first thing required is honesty.
If a man were to tell the little things and leave
out the serious ones, he would be guilty of a
fraud and would make a sacrilegious confession.
He would, as the books say, tell a lie to the Holy
Ghost. These words are taken from the Scrip
ture history of Ananias and Saphira. There
we are told how these people " by fraud " kept
back part of the price of their land, and tried to
persuade St. Peter that they were giving it all.
He told them that they were telling " a lie to the
Holy Ghost," and that they were lying, " not
to men but to God," because the matter was
one which concerned God and not man, and the
lie was told to one who at the moment repre
sented God (Acts. v. i-io).
The Treasure of the Church. 207
The same applies most exactly to a conceal
ment in confession. The man most energetically
professes that he is going to accuse himself of
all his sins : the matter is one which belongs
entirely to the service of God, and is told to the
judge who, by Divine appointment, holds for the
moment the place of God. Anyone who, in
such a case, deliberately conceals a sin which
he knows he ought to confess, is exactly like
Ananias, who "by fraud kept back part of the
price of the land " ; and has, therefore, as St.
Peter tells him, " not lied to men but to God."
If, however, something is omitted accidentally,
it is quite another matter. Then the confession
is " formally" complete ; that is, it is complete as
far as the knowledge of the penitent goes, and
in that case the sins omitted would be forgiven
just as much as those confessed.
The reason of this is clear. The effect of the
sacrament is to restore to us the sanctifying
grace of God ; to give us back " the first robe,"
which necessarily takes away the guilt of sin
from the soul. Almighty God never half forgives
us, so that, if we receive pardon at all, we are
freed from all our grievous offences. . . . In
such a case, however, the sinner is bound to
confess the sins he has omitted, should he after
wards remember them.
Now we have to explain what sins one is
bound to confess. The penitent is bound to
confess all mortal sins : that is, all the sins which
appear to him to have been grievous. This does
2o8 The Treasure of the Church.
not mean that he ought not also to confess
venial sins. He ought to confess all his sins,
as far as it is reasonably possible. It is easy
enough to remember and confess those things
which have been serious and deliberate offences
against God, but to confess everything, however
slight it may be, would be an almost impossible
task, and would involve endless scruples. It is
important, therefore, to remember that it is only
mortal sins which are the necessary matter of
confession ; that is, which we are strictly bound
to confess.
We have also to confess the number of times —
approximately — that each sin has been com
mitted. In many things, most things perhaps,
it is impossible to give any distinct number ;—
to do so would only be guess-work — we have,
then, only to give what idea we can of the
frequency with which things have occurred, in
general terms.
It is necessary also to mention any circum
stances which change the nature of a sin. One
act may involve the violation of two com
mandments. For instance, a lie injuring your
neighbour is a sin against truth, and a sin
against justice, inasmuch as it inflicts a wrong
on another, and it must be told in a way to
make this clear : otherwise it would be keeping
back half the confession.
The declaration must, moreover, be made
humbly — that is, as a self-accusation, not as a
mere narrative. It should also be made simply,
The Treasure of the Church. 209
that is, by saying precisely what you mean, and
not using words which may mean anything or
nothing.
In such a case, it is difficult to understand
what is really meant. It may be something
very trivial or something rather serious.
It may be said that Confession may often
oblige people to mention very unpleasant and
disagreeable details. To this may be said : You
are not bound to go into any details beyond
those which are necessary to explain what kind
of sin you really mean. You should, besides,
remember what the Prophet says : " It is an evil
and a bitter thing for thee to have left the
Lord thy God " (Jer. ii. 19), and therefore,
you should not be too anxious to shirk the
bitterness. We ought not to be bold in sinning,
and then so very timid in confessing our sins.
You should remember, moreover, that if you
are too careful of your own credit, and suppress
every unpleasant detail that can possibly be left
out, you cannot expect any useful advice or
assistance from your confessor, and so lose a
large part of the benefit our Lord means to
give you in the sacrament. It is clear that no
one can give advice worth having, unless the
circumstances of the case are made tolerably
intelligible to him.
It may be well here to mention a few of the
mistakes which people frequently make. The
first fault is that of using vague or exaggerated
language— " I don't love God as I ought"; "I
15
2io The Treasure of the Church.
am a miserable sinner " ; and so forth. Such
expressions mean nothing. We none of us
love God as we ought, and we are all sinners—
so there is no use and no humility in saying
such things. Then comes the fault which we
often find — that of talking too much and making
unnecessary histories either about ourselves or
our neighbours. It is not in the least necessary
to mention the sins of others, and, ordinarily
speaking, we have no right to do so. We have
no right to speak of the sins of other people,
without sufficient reason — either in the confes
sional or out of it. There is a story told,
probably invented as an illustration, of a priest
who said to his penitent : " For your own sins
say, as a penance, five Hail Marys ; — for your
husband's sins, which you have confessed, say
the Seven Penitential Psalms."
Some people always have something to say in
self-defence ; they are anxious to show, if they
have done wrong, that it is chiefly somebody
else's fault. We ought not to make excuses,
but should leave that to the mercy of God ; He
will make all possible excuses for us. The dis
position to excuse oneself is not quite consistent
with a penitential spirit. The Psalmist says :
u Incline not my heart to evil words ; to make
excuses in sins" (Ps. cxl. 4) : a text we
should have before our minds when going to
confession. The very idea of confession is
telling something against yourself. If you
cannot remember anything particular since your
The Treasure of the Church. 211
last confession, you should make mention, in
general terms, of some previous sin, in order
that the priest may have something on which
to pronounce absolution. People, however,
sometimes get so much into the habit of defend
ing themselves, that, although they are very
sincere in acknowledging themselves sinners in
general terms, they will never admit anything
in particular, so that the priest finds it hard to
give them absolution.
Another fault is when people cannot be got to
speak at all, or to speak plainly, without a great
deal of unnecessary trouble. The more you are
thinking about what you have done to offend
God, and the less you think about yourself, the
more likely you are to use plain and simple
language and not to give unnecessary trouble.
Another fault is that people sometimes cannot
be got to listen to what their confessor has to
say to them. Instead of attending to his advice
they are still thinking of their own sins ; that
there is something they might have explained
better, and they interrupt his exhortations by
going back to what they have already said. We
should confess our sins as well as we can, and
then put them aside and place ourselves in spirit
at our Lord's feet, listening humbly to all that
He has to say to us by the mouth of our
confessor.
There is very little to be said about " Satis
faction." The " Penance" is, as I have said,
part of the judicial sentence, and the penitent
212 The Treasure of the Church.
must be willing to accept the sentence if he is to
obtain the benefit of absolution. If afterwards
he neglects to perform this penance, he is guilty
of a sin, but the neglect does not undo the
forgiveness he has already received.
In the present discipline of the Church the
penance enjoined is always a very trifling thing,
being, as I before explained, an acknowledgment
that we deserve punishment, rather than a real
punishment. Would it not be absurd to talk of
saying u Five Mysteries of the Rosary," or " the
Litany of the Holy Name," as & punishment for
sin ! Yet the idea of penance seems to have taken
a strong hold of the imaginations of our Protestant
friends. They seem to have a general idea that
any priest may command any Catholic he meets
to do anything he pleases, however unpleasant.
We look on with wonder and admiration at the
remarkable things enjoined on the Catholic
laity— in Protestant novels. How devoted and
obedient they all are — in books !
Worse than that, Protestants sometimes seem
to fancy that we look for forgiveness, not in
repentance and in the Precious Blood of our
Lord, but in piling up practices of mortification :
so Scott says :
" My breast in belt of iron pent,
With shirt of hair and scourg-e of thorn,
For three score years in penance spent
My knees these flinty stones have worn,
And all too little to atone
For knowing1 what should ne'er be known."
The Treasure of the Church. 213
What a pity it is that, in serious subjects,
intelligent people will not take the trouble to
understand what they are talking about, before
they begin to talk !
I can only add that there is no necessity for
saying your penance immediately — before re
ceiving Holy Communion, for instance — unless
that is distinctly enjoined. It is, however, most
desirable to say your penance as soon as you
can, otherwise there is great danger of forgetting
it. It seems hardly necessary to say that, if a
particular prayer is given to you as a penance,
you need only say it once, unless a certain
number of times is specified ; but one has
known of people who thought they had to go
on repeating their penances till they went to
confession again.
I have a few more things to say about the
Sacrament of Penance which must be reserved
for another chapter.
CHAPTER IX.
PENANCE, THE SACRAMENT OF AMENDMENT AND
OF PERFECTION.
It helps us to Strive. — Protestant Objections answered. —
Points of Self-examination. — Contrition, the most important
condition. — Frequency and Regularity. — General Con
fessions. — Form of Confession. — Choice of a Confessor. —
Indulgences. — The Principle in Scripture. — Atonement. —
Assistance given by the Church. — The Precise Effect. —
The Usual Terms. — General Recapitulation.
I HAVE spoken of the Sacrament of Penance as
the ordinary means for the forgiveness of sins.
Our Lord came into this world expressly to save
mankind from their great enemy, sin. It was,
therefore, only to be expected that He would
tell us exactly what we must do to obtain pardon,
and that He would do something to make more
easy the path of the sinner returning to God.
" There shall be joy before the angels of God
over one sinner doing penance" (St. Lukexv. 10).
If the angels of God rejoice over the repenting
sinner, O how dear must that sinner be to the
Sacred Heart of Jesus, since He loves us with
a tenderness infinitely surpassing the love of
The Treasure of the Church. 215
any created being. " I have loved thee with an
everlasting love, therefore have I drawn thee,
taking pity on thee" (Jer. xxxi. 3).
The first work of the Sacrament of Penance,
therefore, is to reconcile sinners to God, and to
restore to them the garment of Divine Grace.
There is however a second object for this Sacra
ment scarcely less important. It is intended as
a means of improvement, for the sanctification of
the just. "He that is just, let him be justified
still : and he that is holy, let him be sanctified
still" (Apoc. xxii. 11). It is the duty of every
Christian to aim at perfection : " Be ye therefore
perfect as also your heavenly Father is perfect "
(St. Matt. v. 48).
It is impossible for us to be perfect in fact, so
we must understand that our perfection consists
in striving, to the best of our power, to copy the
great example put before us. Every Christian,
therefore, ought to try diligently to amend his
faults and to acquire fresh virtues. If he does
not do this, in some degree, he is pretty sure to
fall away and to become worse as he grows
older.
Penance is the special sacrament given us
for this purpose. It encourages us, and almost
obliges us, to look into ourselves and see what
our faults are, and to make good resolutions for
the future ; and, in addition, it bestows special
graces from God to enable us to amend our
lives.
For this purpose, however, it is obviously
216 The Treasure of the Church.
necessary that Confession should be repeated
at moderately short intervals. How could it
seriously affect our conduct if we received it on
rare and distant occasions ? Accordingly, all
good Catholics who desire to please God make
a point of going frequently to confession, and
are uneasy if they feel that they have allowed
too long a time to elapse without having made
use of this means of grace, even if they are not
conscious of having committed serious sins.
Protestants sometimes say: "How bad your
people must be if they have so many sins to
confess." Not at all. It is not because they
have many or grievous sins to confess that
they go so often, but they want to overcome the
frailties, and the many faults they find in them
selves. St. John says in his first Epistle.: " If
we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and
the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins,
He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins,
and to cleanse us from all iniquity " (i St. John
i. 8).
We are aware that we have plenty of faults,
and think that regular self-examination and
confession of our sins, whether great or small,
with graces bestowed by the Sacraments of
Penance and the Holy Eucharist, are a sovereign
remedy given us by God.
The want of comprehension of this simple fact
leads many Protestant writers into great absur
dities. I have read somewhere in Protestant
fiction of a lady, who, " having got over
The Treasure of the Church. 217
the hysterical agonies of self-abasement which
characterised her earlier confessions, had now
settled down into a mere lifeless routine " — or
some such words. Nothing can be more absurd.
Catholics go to confession in a most prosaic
manner, without any sort of hysterical excite
ment. They use the sacrament carefully and
thankfully, prepare themselves diligently for it,
and hope, at any rate, to derive spiritual benefits
from it. Confession, on the other hand, never
sinks to a mere routine, but is always considered
as a most important duty and is accompanied by
many prayers. Is is plain, however, that a duty
which you have to do every few weeks, however
important you consider it, can never cause any
great excitement, but naturally becomes a matter
of course, however diligently it is done. This
applies to ordinary confessions, but plainly the
conversion of a sinner is a thing which makes a
much deeper impression.
I now come to another very common objection.
People say : " You go to confession, and think
you have got rid of all your sins, and need not
trouble about them any further, but can com
fortably begin a new score." Such things you
hear pretty often said or implied. Of course,
they are said by people who have absolutely no
knowledge or experience of the effects of the
Sacrament of Penance.
When you think of it, it is a most remarkable
opinion. Why should you forget all your sins,
and discharge them from your mind because you
218 The Treasure of the Church.
have confessed them ? Is it because you have
taken the trouble to examine your own conscience
and consider what your sins really are, instead
of contenting yourself with a vague and misty
feeling of sinfulness? Or is it because you have
been at some pains to make an act of sorrow
for them and a good resolution against them?
Surely, no one will seriously maintain that these
things are likely to make you forget? Then it
must be because you have reason to believe that
your sins are forgiven.
When Nathan said to David: "The Lord
also hath taken away thy sin ; thou shalt not
die" (2 Kings xii. 13), are we to suppose
David promptly forgot all about his iniquity?
So when our Lord said to the man with the
palsy : " Be of good heart, son, thy sins are
forgiven thee " (St. Matt. ix. 2), will anyone
pretend that this forgiveness was likely to have
an injurious effect on the sinner who was thus
assured of forgiveness ?
Our Lord many times repeated this assurance
of forgiveness, as if such assurance was neces
sary to enable men to profit by other gifts.
Indeed, how could a man lead a Christian life if
he had not a reasonable ground for hoping that
he was living in the grace of God ? The Psalmist
says : "I said I will confess against myself my
injustice to the Lord, and thou hast forgiven the
wickedness of my sin" (Ps. xxxi. 5). Why should
not Catholics also confess their iniquity, and
rejoice to think that God has forgiven them ?
The Treasure of the Church. 219
In fact, Catholics do not forget their sins
because they have confessed them, but each
confession brings with it a renewal of sorrow for
all the past sins of our lives. The book of
Ecclesiasticus says : " Be not without fear about
sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin " (Ecclus.
v. 5). No one can be absolutely sure that he is
in a state of grace. The Scripture says a " man
knoweth not whether he be worthy of love or
hatred " (Eccles. ix. i) ; still it is the greatest
possible blessing to have a plain way opened
to us by which we may obtain a reasonably con
fident hope that we have received God's pardon.
In order to avoid any danger of forgetting
past sins, it is the custom amongst Catholics
always to make a general mention of past sins,
and to include them expressly in their act of
contrition.
But what about Protestants? They, too
believe that their sins are forgiven them. They
are not quite sure when or how, or where, but
they seem at least as confident about their
pardon as Catholics are ; indeed, to us, they
sometimes appear a little too confident. How is
it that the feeling that they are pardoned does
not produce in them the disastrous effects they
suppose Confession and Absolution to produce
in Catholics? In fact, the objection does not
admit of argument, but is simply an ingrained
prejudice. Protestants, in spite of all we can
say, and all that is written in our books, choose
to believe that the Sacrament of Penance does
22O The Treasure of the Church.
not require a real contrition and purpose of
amendment, and judge us unjustly in con
sequence.
It is also objected that Confession leads to
scruples. Certainly it may, and so may every
thing else. A scrupulous person will be scrupu
lous about everything, and the only thing which
can really cure scrupulosity is the direction to be
found in the confessional. If one who is
scrupulous will only follow advice and be
obedient, he will speedily be freed from his
trouble.
Those who give way to a scrupulous turn of
mind are exposed to great dangers. There is
no end to the different subjects on which
scruples will arise, and scrupulous people often
waste their lives in brooding over imaginary
difficulties and sins. Whatever they do seems
wrong ; and their religion, instead of bringing
peace and joy, is a perpetual pain. Moreover,
those who are scrupulous over trifles, are easily
led to disregard serious matters. They are so
busy with sins which exist only in their own
imagination that they cannot attend properly to
the real duties of a religious life, or guard
efficiently against real dangers.
Scruples are really a sort of false conscience,
and you cannot disregard them without appear
ing to go against the dictates of your conscience.
The only remedy is to appeal to a higher con
science, which tells you that it is your duty to
disregard these appearances of evil, and go on
The Treasure of the Church. 221
your way calmly in spite of them. This, how
ever, it is very hard to do without some impartial
advice, fitted to show you what really are the
true dictates of conscience which have to be
followed.
A scrupulous person, therefore, should take
pains to find out a judicious confessor, and then
most carefully follow his advice and direction.
I must now speak of the preparation for Con
fession. This is a very important matter,
because, as I have said, what we receive from
the sacraments is in proportion to our capacity
for receiving ; and that generally depends on the
pains we have taken in preparing ourselves for
receiving them.
We have to examine our consciences. This
is obvious, because it would plainly be a
mockery if we pretended to confess our sins with
out having taken at least reasonable trouble to
find out what they were. It is a great mistake,
however, to give too much time to this part of
the work. It is common enough to find people
who exhaust themselves in remembering their
sins with unnecessary minuteness, and then
have very little time to give to that which is
much more important, namely, those prayers
and considerations which are necessary to put
themselves into good dispositions of hearty
sorrow and firm purpose of amendment. In
most prayer books you find an " Examination of
Conscience," that is, a series of questions which
you may ask yourself about your past sins.
222 The Treasure of the Church.
People often waste time, and perhaps make
themselves scrupulous by reading these, and so,
generally speaking, it is better to avoid them.
The best way as a general rule to make a
good examination of conscience seems to be
careful consideration of the different duties of
your life. If you know how you have done these,
you also know pretty well what sins you have
committed.
Our first duty is immediately to God. We
have to reverence, serve, and love our Creator ;
—to pay Him, as I have said, the worship of
faith, of hope, and of charity. We have also
to perform the duties demanded by the virtue of
religion — which are the practical carrying out
of these virtues. Have we been reverent to
God? Have we paid our debt of prayer to Him
as we ought? Do we try to love Him and please
Him ? Do we take reasonable pains in His
service, and give reasonable time to it? Under
this head come all the duties commanded by the
Church in His Name and for His honour : such
as hearing Mass, receiving the sacraments, and
observing the laws of the Church.
Next come our duties to our neighbours :
duties to superiors, equals and inferiors. These
involve our duties to our own families and those
duties of our state of life, which bring us into
constant communication with others. It is
simple enough to ask ourselves whether we
have been just and honest and straightforward
in our dealings with them, and also whether
The Treasure of the Church. 223
we have been kind and forbearing as we ought
to have been.
The third point of examination is, in some
respects, the most difficult, and that is our duties
to ourselves.
To this class belong the consideration of the
good or bad use of all the gifts of body and
mind which we possess. We ought to be, as
St. Peter tells us, " good stewards of the mani
fold grace of God" (i St. Peter iv. 10); and,
therefore, we have to ask ourselves whether we
have used our bodies and our souls as we ought.
Have we used our time and talents as our
Master would wish us ? or have we, like the
wicked servant in the parable, made no use at
all of them ? or worse, have we made an evil
use of them ? This involves an inquiry into our
own secret thoughts, and many things which do
not immediately affect our neighbours. These
are often grievously sinful, as being an abuse of
the powers of body and mind given to us.
In this world, people are very apt to forget
the importance of these things, and yet these
secret thoughts are the sources of all evil. Our
Lord says : " From the heart come forth evil
thoughts, murders, adulteries" (St. Matt. xv.
19); and also He says: " Blessed are the
clean of heart, for they shall see God " (St.
Matt. v. 8). It would be to little purpose,
therefore, for us to know what external sins we
had committed, if we did not take into con
sideration the secret thoughts from which they
224 The Treasure of the Church.
sprung. Under this heading come sins of
thought of all kinds, and all sins of excess
and self-indulgence.
It must be observed, however, that people
often fail to distinguish sufficiently between
temptations and sins. Everyone is liable to
temptations, and to temptations of the worst
description. Even the saints were not free from
them. St. Paul says : " There was given to me
a sting of my flesh, an angel of Satan to buffet
me. For which thing thrice I besought the
Lord that it might depart from me. And he
said to me : My grace is sufficient for thee : for
power is made perfect in infirmity " (2 Cor.
xii. 7).
We cannot expect to be free from such
assaults. All we have to do, when assailed by
evil thoughts, is calmly to turn away from them
and direct our minds to something else, saying,
if we can, some short prayer. If we do this,
instead of committing a sin, we have gained a
victory.
There are two of these points, however,
on which it is desirable to make a special
examination. The first of these is the duties
of one's state of life. Every good Christian
ought to take very much to heart the duties
of his particular calling. These duties are
the work which God has given him to do
in life, and naturally they occupy the largest
part of his time, and he should look on
them as the ladder by which God means him to
The Treasure of the Church. 225
climb to heaven. He should, therefore, ask
himself whether he is doing them carefully,
conscientiously and kindly, and try to correct
any faults he may discover in the performance
of them.
The second point is to consider how he
carries out the laws of the Church. It is hardly
necessary to say that these are really the laws
of God, since our only motive for obeying them
is the obedience we owe to God. From the
nature of them, they are often a more distinct
trial of our obedience than anything else. They
are, besides, a great proof of our loyalty, because
they are, in a special way, the outward signs of
our profession. By observing them carefully
we confess our Lord before men : " Everyone,
therefore, that shall confess me before men, I
will also confess him before my Father Who is
in heaven " (St. Matt. x. 32). The laws of the
Church often give us our best opportunity of
confessing Christ before men. Everyone, there
fore, should ask himself whether he has been
true to this confession, or whether, out of care
lessness, cowardice, or self-indulgence, he has
neglected to make this true confession.
If anyone periodically asked himself a few
questions on the points I have suggested, I
think he would pretty well know, as St. James
(i. 24) says, "what manner of man he was," and he
would probably find out very easily what sins
he had to confess, and see in what particulars
amendment was necessary.
16
226 Tlie Treasure of the Church.
The preparation for confession ought always
to begin with earnest prayer and a sense of the
presence of God. The Catechism says : " First,
we must heartily pray for grace to make a good
confession ; secondly, we must carefully examine
our conscience ; thirdly, we must take time and
care to make a good act of contrition ; and
fourthly, we must resolve by the grace of God to
renounce our sins, and to begin a new life for
the future."
The most important part of all, as I before
said, is the " Act of Contrition." By this, we
humble ourselves before God and ask His
pardon : we try to feel the most sincere sorrow
possible for past offences and the strongest
possible determination to amend our lives. To
this part of the preparation we cannot give too
much attention.
But supposing some one says : u I do not feel
any sorrow for my past sins "?
The catechism tells us that : " We may obtain
a hearty sorrow for our sins by earnestly praying
for it, and by making use of such considerations
as may lead us to it." If anyone is not sorry
for his sins it is his own fault. If he chooses to
consider the evil of sin in itself, since it is a
rebellion against his Creator — and its terrible
consequences, since it must inevitably separate
him from the Supreme Good — he will certainly
be sorry for his sins. The best way, however,
to obtain the grace of contrition is to place
oneself in spirit at the foot of the cross and think
The Treasure of the Church. 227
of all that the Son of God, made man, suffered
to redeem us from sin. Nothing can give us a
greater idea of the evil of sin than considering
the great price that paid the atonement for it.
One great object of the Sacrament of Penance
is to enable us to make progress in virtue, but
to produce this effect it must be received fre
quently and regularly. But what is frequently ?
This, of course, depends on the condition of life
in which people find themselves placed and their
own spiritual state. We read of saints who
went to confession every day, but this cannot
be taken as a rule for ordinary people. A
good many people go to confession regularly
every week, or every fortnight, and this is an
excellent practice for those who really aim at
perfection, supposing their avocations in life
allow them the opportunity. If you do this,
you have a great insight into your habitual
faults and a constant incentive to amend them.
Most people could very well manage to go to
confession and communion every month if they
wished. To those who go irregularly, whenever
the fancy takes them, and at long intervals, con
fession is valuable indeed as a means of obtain
ing the pardon of God, but cannot be much help
in a religious life.
Besides ordinary confessions, it is usual to
make " general confessions " from time to time
— that is, to make an examination and confession
of one's whole life, or of some longish portion
of it. Those who periodically make spiritual
228 The Treasure of the Church.
retreats, generally think it well to make a con
fession of all the principal things since the last
retreat, or some longer time. Confessions like
these give us an opportunity of seeing how we
are getting on in the service of God, and make
it easier to obtain a specially earnest contrition
and to make more determined and vigorous
plans for self-improvement.
In such confessions it is not necessary to
mention everything in detail, or, indeed, to
confess any sin, unless there is real reason for
supposing that it has never been confessed
before.
The only objection to frequent confession is in
the case of scrupulous people. Their scrupu
losity often takes the form of urging them to go
to confession very frequently, not from a desire
to amend their faults, but because they are
perpetually dissatisfied with their past confes
sions, or because they are always fancying that
they have fallen into some sin or other. In such
cases, people should be entirely guided by the
advice of their confessors, since, as I before
said, a rigorous obedience is the only way to get
rid of the dangerous fault of scrupulosity.
In all prayer-books you find a form of con
fession laid down. You ask the priest's blessing,
and then say the first half of the Confiteor.
After making your confession, it is usual to
finish with a little prayer including in general
terms any other sins that you may have for
gotten. It is well, however, to remark that
The Treasure of the Church. 229
these forms are quite unnecessary, and, gener
ally speaking, the best way is to begin at once
by mentioning how long it is since your last
confession. This saves a good deal of time,
and you may very well say the form of confes
sion before you go in, though you need not
do so.
I must add a few words about the choice of a
confessor. The Church leaves us perfectly free
to choose any priest having faculties. The
parish priest (where there are parishes) has a
right to administer the Holy Viaticum and
Extreme Unction, but you need not make him
your confessor. Moreover, you can change
whenever you please. Should it happen, for
instance, that on any occasion you prefer to go
to a stranger, you are quite at liberty to do so ;
and you need not tell your ordinary confessor
that you have done so.
It is very important not to attach yourself too
much to any one priest : you ought to be ready
to go to any confessor who is within your reach.
If you make a point of always going to the
same person, you are often prevented from going
regularly to your duties, and run the risk of
thinking too much of the man, and too little of
the sacrament. It is to our Lord we must look,
and not to the individual who for the moment
holds His place.
It is a good thing, however, to have some
" director" — that is, some priest whose advice in
spiritual matters you may occasionally seek.
230 The Treasure of the Church.
In the Holy Scriptures we constantly see that
God used other men to direct even His greatest
servants. " Arise and go into the city, and
there it shall be told thee what thou must do "
(Acts ix. 7). If our Lord made use of Ananias
to direct St. Paul, it is not wonderful that we
should be obliged to seek the direction of others
in order to learn the will of God.
Direction, however, does not mean that we
give over the charge of our souls to another.
Ultimately we have to follow our own con
sciences ; but these often require to be enlight
ened, and if we do not take pains to get all the
light we can, it is our own fault if we go astray
in difficult matters.
There is another point connected with penance
on which I wish to dwell — that is, on indul
gences.
This, in detail, is rather a difficult and com
plicated question, but the principle of it is
exceedingly simple. The doctrine of indulgences
follows very immediately and plainly from the
belief that we are accountable to God for all our
actions. By this we mean that God takes note
of every offence which men commit against His
law, and punishes men for all their offences.
Sometimes men rebel against God in such a
complete manner as to cut themselves off from
Him altogether ; but even when their sins are not
sufficiently grievous for this, they deserve punish
ment, and incur a debt, if we may say so, to the
justice of God, which has to be paid somehow.
The Treasure of the Church. 231
This principle seems to be the foundation of
all religion. I should think there never was a
religion which did not hold that men were
responsible to their Creator for their actions.
St. Paul says : " He thatcometh to God must
believe that He is, and is a rewarder to them
that seek Him " (Heb. xi. 6). And God in
Scripture is described as a patient rewarder. The
Old and the New Testaments are full of this
thought that men must render an account of all
their actions. In Genesis we read : " If thou do
well, shalt thou not receive ? But if ill, shall
not sin forthwith be present at the door ? " (Gen.
iv. 7). In the Apocalypse, the last book of the
Bible, we find the same : ' ' Behold I come quickly,
and my reward is with me to render to everyone
according to his works " (Apoc. xxii. 12). And
our Lord Himself says that " every idle word that
men shall speak, they shall render an account
for it in the day of judgment " (St. Matt,
xii. 36).
In the Old Testament, moreover, we find that
God, in His dealings, insists very much on some
punishment, and this, even with His chosen
servants, sometimes in cases where the fault
appears to us to be trifling. For instance,
when Moses had twice struck the rock, the Lord
said: " Because you have not believed Me, to
sanctify Me before the children of Israel, you
shall not bring these people into the land which
I shall give them " (Num. xx. 12). Again,
when King David numbered the people, how
232 T7ie Treasure of the Church.
severe, as we should say, was the Lord in His
punishment !
The debt which we owe to the justice of
Almighty God is contracted in two ways. The
Catechism says : " Those souls go to Purgatory
that depart this life in venial sin ; or that have
not fully paid the debt of temporal punishment
due to those sins of which the guilt has been
forgiven." First as to mortal sins. When the
sin has been forgiven — that is, when the special
guilt of rebellion which is the essential quality
of mortal sin has been remitted — there still
remains a heavy debt to be paid. " And David
said to Nathan : I have sinned against the Lord.
And Nathan said to David : The Lord also hath
taken away thy sin ; thou shalt not die. Never
theless because thou hast given occasion to the
enemies of the Lord to blaspheme, for this thing,
the child that is born to thee shall surely die "
(2 Kings xii. 13).
Here we have clearly laid down that repent
ance and forgiveness do not necessarily bring
with them a deliverance from all the punishment
the sin has deserved. If all punishment were
always remitted on repentance, there would be
an end of the principle that God will render to
everyone " according to his works." But pun
ishment is also due for venial sins. These sins,
as I have said, come generally from the weakness
of our nature, from surprise, inadvertence, and
other causes which we cannot altogether avoid.
We cannot avoid them certainly, but we could
The Treasure of the Church. 233
very much reduce the number of them. If we
watched and prayed as our Lord tells us to do,
we should commit, in comparison, very few of
those venial sins. Naturally we are responsible
to God, not for the weakness of our nature, but for
the want of proper diligence and care which lead
to so many faults.
When we think how many great sins men
commit, and how very little trouble the gener
ality of men take to avoid smaller sins, it is only
too plain that most of us are debtors to God's
justice.
From the belief that by every sin we incur a
debt, comes naturally the desire to do something
to pay this debt whenever we can do so. It
would seem very hard if we were not allowed to
do so in this life ; and our Lord expressly says :
"Be at agreement with thy adversary betimes
whilst thou art in the way with him : lest
perhaps the adversary deliver thee to the judge,
and the judge deliver thee to the officer, and
thou be cast into prison. Amen I say to thee,
thou shalt not go out from thence till thou repay
the last farthing " (St. Matt. v. 25).
Such a desire on our part to do something to
atone for our sins, and to pay the debt contracted
must be pleasing to God. A servant, we are
told, was brought to his master, owing him ten
thousand talents which he could not pay. " But
that servant falling down besought him, saying :
Have patience with me and I will pay thee all "
(St. Matt, xviii. 26). Although he could not
234 The Treasure of the Church.
discharge the debt, his very desire must have
had some influence in obtaining the pardon,
of which he afterwards showed himself so
unworthy.
If one of us had two debtors, owing us large
sums, and one of them showed himself very
anxious to do something in payment, whilst the
other simply dismissed his debt from his mind,
I think we should greatly favour the former.
We cannot doubt, therefore, that our Lord
helps those who show an anxiety to do some
thing to atone. He accepts easy payment from
them : He accepts their atonement when they
udo penance in sackcloth and ashes" (St.
Matt. xi. 21). He accepts their patient bearing
of the sufferings He may please to send them
in this life ; and, most of all, He accepts what
ever offerings of love they may make to Him.
" Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath
loved much " (St. Luke vii. 47). An earnest
love of our Lord, and of the poor for His sake,
are the best things which men can do to pay the
debt incurred by sin.
From this it seems to follow, that part of the
office of the Church must be to assist those who
are in these dispositions. The Church is estab
lished on earth on purpose to carry out His bene
ficent will to sinners. For this He said : " All
power is given to me in heaven and upon earth "
(St. Matt, xxviii. 18). " Whatsoever you shall
bind upon earth shall be bound also in heaven,
and whatsoever you shall loose upon earth shall
The Treasure of the Church. 235
be loosed also in heaven " (St. Matt, xviii.
1 8). This is precisely what the Church does
when she grants indulgences. She seems
to say to us: " You know that you owe a
heavy debt to the justice of God and earnestly
wish to pay some of it : I therefore, in His
Name, and by His authority, provide you
with certain easy ways by which you may,
in part, pay that great debt you owe. You
must, however, first reconcile yourself with
Him by contrition and the use of the sacraments.
I can do nothing for you so long as you
remain in a state of rebellion against your
Creator."
The Church then proceeds to grant indul
gences — sometimes plenary, sometimes for a
number of years, with a corresponding number
of quarantines or periods of forty days — on
certain conditions. Plenary indulgences are the
remission of the whole debt due, and the partial
indulgences are a remission of that part of the
debt which would correspond to a canonical
penance, such as the early Church would have
imposed for certain sins.
Now comes the question : Why should there
be so many indulgences, and particularly why
should there be more than one " plenary indul
gence " ? A plain answer to this is that in this
life we keep on sinning — " A just man shall fall
seven times, and shall rise again " (Prov. xxiv.
16) ; and "If we say that we have no sin, we
deceive ourselves " (i. John i. 8) — therefore so
236 The Treasure of the Church.
long as we live we ought to keep on making
efforts to pay the debt incurred by our sins.
We may also say that these indulgences are
granted on certain conditions, and it is very
difficult or impossible for us to say how far we
have complied with these conditions.
The opinions of theologians are rather divided
as to the exact effect of indulgences received
with the imperfect dispositions which most of
us, or all of us, have. Then you will say : I
cannot know how much I have gained by my
indulgences ? I reply : Certainly you cannot —
and a very good thing too. It is your duty to
do what you can to pay your debt, but you are
not to keep a debtor and creditor account with
Almighty God.
It is almost necessary for us to have a reason
able certainty that we are living in the friendship
of God, and therefore the Church tells us very
clearly what has to be done. We cannot know
with certainty, since " man knoweth not whether
he be worthy of love or hatred" (Eccles. ix. i),
but we may have all reasonable security if
we have honestly used the means of reconciliation
provided for us. It is not necessary, however,
for us to know exactly how much of our debt we
have succeeded in paying. It would probably be
very bad for us if we did know. The Church,
therefore, is indefinite on such questions, and
says very little beyond assuring us that the
pious use of indulgences will be very valuable
to us when the time of reckoning comes : as to
The Treasure of the Church. 237
further particulars she leaves us to form our own
judgments.
It may be also said that indulgences arev often
granted for very little things. The Church
wants to encourage some devout prayers, or
charitable works, and grants indulgences to
those who practise them. We may say, however
that, although they seem so easy, the number of
those who avail themselves of them is not very
great. People who are very much in earnest
take the trouble to find them out and use them
— and these are just those who deserve a
remission of punishment.
It may truly be said that an anxiety to obtain
indulgences is a great mark of earnestness, and
cannot be too much commended — unless, indeed,
it be allowed to interfere with the time and
tranquility of mind which we ought to devote
to prayer, the presence of God, and the use of
the Sacraments. For most of us, practically, it
is enough to be anxious to obtain the indulgences
granted to whatever prayers we can say, and to
whatever good works we are able to do, without
distracting ourselves by going too closely into
the details of a great number of indulgences.
It remains to consider the conditions on which
indulgences are granted. What are these con
ditions? You sometimes see or hear announce
ments that " indulgences are granted on the
usual terms" — which to some people sounds
suggestive, not to say sinister. There is nothing
however, very alarming in them. Take the
238 The Treasure of the Church.
" Manual of Prayer" published by the English
Bishops, and you will find the Conditions of
Indulgences as follows (Appendix p. 15) : —
" i. That the faithful confess their sins, with
sincere repentance, to a priest approved by the
bishop.
" 2. That they worthily receive the Holy
Communion.
" 3. That, if their state and condition allow it,
they give some alms to the poor on the eve or
on the day of their Communion.
"4. That on the day of their Communion,
they offer up some prayers to God, for the whole
state of the Catholic Church throughout the
world ; for bringing back all straying souls to
the fold of Christ ; for the general peace of
Christendom ; and for the blessing of God upon
this nation."
The book gives several other sets of conditions,
which, however, are all substantially the same.
The first condition for gaining the benefit of
an indulgence always is to be in a state of grace.
No one living in mortal sin can possibly benefit
by an indulgence so long as he remains in that
state. The other conditions vary according to
the special objects for which the indulgences are
granted. They are given for money, people
exclaim. Of course, they are — that is to say,
almsgiving in some form or other is generally
made one of the conditions for obtaining indul
gences when people can afford to give. " Prayer
fasting, and almsdeeds " have always been con-
The Treasure of the Church. 239
sidered as pre-eminent good works. " Redeem
thou thy sins with alms, and thy iniquities with
works of mercy to the poor " (Dan. iv 24).
" Alms deliver from all sin and from death" (Tob.
iv. 1 1). The Holy Scripture is full of such words.
One would think the people who talk about
indulgences had never heard of such things !
What can be more reasonable than that a rich
man should be required to give alms, either to
the Church or to the poor, as a condition for
paying the debt he owes to God, particularly
as, generally speaking, his wealth has a great
deal to do with his sins ?
But such things may be abused. Of that I have
no doubt, since there is nothing to be found on
earth which men do not abuse. If they are
abused, so much the worse for those who abuse
them ; but they do not therefore render the
reasonable use of them unlawful or inexpedient.
A great deal is said, for instance, about the
indulgences granted by Pope Leo X. He was
rebuilding the Basilica of St. Peter, which may
be called the Cathedral of the World. Very
naturally he made some contribution corre
sponding with their means one of the conditions
of gaining these indulgences. What could be
more reasonable ? Surely it is a good work to
build a church to God's honour. We all
remember with what liberality the Jews gave
for ornamenting the tabernacle, till Moses was
obliged to forbid further offerings. Indeed they
were all obliged to give — " everyone of them shall
240 The Treasure of the Church.
give a price for their souls to the Lord " (Exod.
xxx. 12). How, then, can it be otherwise than
right for Christians to do the same ? Why may
not such contributions be considered as amongst
those things by which men pay their debt to
God's justice ?
Similarly the Popes granted large indulgences
to those who helped in the wars against the
Turks ; that is, contributions in money or
service were made, for people who could afford
them, one of the conditions for gaining these
indulgences. Again, what could be more
reasonable? The Christian world was fighting
for its existence against the almost overwhelming
power of the Turks. Humanly speaking, Europe
would have been overrun by them, but for the
exertions of the Popes — thanks to the supineness
of the European nations. Can anyone doubt
that to assist in such a war was an excellent
good work, and one which might reasonably be
made a condition for the forgiveness of the debt
of temporal punishment due for sin ?
We hear a great deal of the rapacity of the
Popes and the clergy, but perhaps not enough
of the stinginess of the laity. It is difficult to
read the history of those times without seeing
how very backward they were sometimes. They
expected the Popes to do great things for the
defence of Christendom, and moreover to settle
an infinity of questions from all parts of the
world, but they did not think it necessary to
supply them with the requisite funds to carry
The Treasure of the Church. 241
out the work. The Popes were to make bricks,
but without straw. If the laity had been a little
more generous, or rather more just, we should
have heard a great deal less of Ecclesiastical
rapacity.
I have now come to the end of my subject.
I have considered the Holy Eucharist as the
one, great, central mystery of the Catholic
Church, and the Sacrament of Penance as an
almost necessary accompaniment of the Holy
Eucharist.
Let me recapitulate in a few words.
The Holy Eucharist is the great treasure of
the Church as a body, and the great treasure of
every Christian soul. By It, the Incarnation is
extended and prolonged. By It, the Incarnation
is brought home, not only to every age and
every country, but to every little village and to
every household, and the benefit of it is com
municated fully to every Christian soul.
By It, the Great sacrifice of Mount Calvary is
made an event of all ages, and the Lamb, "slain
from the beginning of the world " (Apoc. xiii.
8), is presented as a perpetual sacrifice in which
all generations may share. By It, all men
are brought into communion with our Lord,
as the members to their Head, and through
Him are made " members one of another"
(Eph. iv. 25). By It, is opened that great
fountain of grace which God has given to
men, and men on earth are allowed to partake
of the " bread of angels " (Ps. Ixxvii. 25).
17
242 The Treasure of the Church.
Let me conclude with the words of St Cyril of
Alexandria : " As for ourselves, if we would win
life everlasting ; if we would that the Giver of
immortality should dwell in us, let us run freely
to receive this Blessing, and let us beware that
the devil succeed not in laying a stumbling-
block in our way in the shape of a mistaken
reverence. . . Therefore I counsel thee to betake
thee to godly thoughts, and to live carefully and
holily, and so to receive that Blessing — a Bless
ing which, believe me, doth banish not death
only, but all diseases likewise. For when Christ
dwelleth in us, He stilleth the law of death in
our members, which warreth against the law of
our mind ; He giveth strength to godliness, He
turneth to calm the turbulent surging of our
mind, He cureth them that are sick, He raiseth
up them which are fallen, and, like the Good
Shepherd who giveth His life for the sheep, He
prevailed! that the sheep perish not." (8th and
Lessons, Oct. day, Corpus Christi.)
THE END.
LIBRARY
,ȣSUIT PROVINCIAL'S RESIDENCE
TORONTO
63664